


Relative Immortality

by Abby_Ebon



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-20
Updated: 2013-09-05
Packaged: 2017-11-08 04:26:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 28,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/439137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Abby_Ebon/pseuds/Abby_Ebon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Why would Hidan want immortality? Well, mostly it's so you don't die, right? What if it wasn't so simple as that? What if it was because he didn't want to endure the fact that his death would be the final decent into madness for his brother; Harry Potter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Buried

_-Buried-_

Suffocating beneath the dirt and grit, Hidan still was not yet dead. He could not take a breath, he could not scream. He was smothered, lips kissing soil, and mouth long since dry. He dared not bleed. Blood was life, a small death, and if he died – _bled and dried and withered_ – too much, it would be his final death. He could not, _would not_ , die here.

It was an annoyance, the dirt, the dry earthy grit pressed to skin and sensitive bits of flesh and bone and muscle, not meant to be exposed to so harsh elements. At first it had been pain, and fear, then _numbness_ , now – annoyance, less then either of the former. There was also boredom, it grated his thoughts, his body, in shreds and pieces as it was – still was whole, still was one – he wiggled his pinky or his big toe, and knew _they_ wiggled. It offered some amount of amusement, knowing his limbs, as severed and disconnected and buried as he was, still obeyed.

They would not for long. Numbness would become bleakness, and deadened limbs would –eventually - not respond to him, then he would be _as good as_ dead. Still, he would continue on alive – if not breathing, if not seeing, if not hearing – _alive_ , for far longer then anyone on the surface would suspect.

What had been done to him, buried alive as broken shards of his former self – it would be considered cruel, were they aware that he was just as aware as they, to what his fate would be. He would linger, buried and forgotten, living on – _aware_ of his final, slow damning death. It would be a while yet.

Blood was life, and life was counted in the years leading up to death. What people did not know, _did not realize_ , was that 'life' which they thought the dates of which were preordained; even after the events of birth and death were written in the stone of their tombs, shifted and fluxed and fluttered, consistently like a second heartbeat.

When something went wrong, when _life was threatened_ to be only days, to hours, to moments, well the _life_ that they had had pervious claim to, if it be years or months, did not merely flutter away from them like a willful bird.

No, it went to Jashin, or – more rarely – to Hidan, by proximity, by ritual – by murder, by shared pain, and shared death. Jashin was natural death, as far as things could be measured, he would live as long as anything else – mortal or god – did.

Hidan was young, yet still a death god, living off stolen life that was not his own, and surely not a mortal anymore; in comparison, so long as Hidan remembered to thank Jashin when he killed, to celebrate his gift was granted to him by a god – he lived off that stolen life expectancy, and that flux added upon his own years. Even so, his years – his life expectancy _did not_ shift, no matter if it was threatened. It was a solid thing, weighing down and dragging upon him, Hidan knew the day, the hour and moment that he would die.

It would be centuries.

Still, not even Jashin could explain, how the one whom Hidan _lived for_ , survived. Hidan closed his eyes, as much as he was able. Once, his little brother had had a life flux, a fragile fluttering thing, as any other might – even within the womb of their mother. Hidan had been able to see (not sense) how long people would live since he was very little. He would always remember his mother with perfect clarity, no matter how long he lived on upon the surface, while _her_ bones turned to dust. Her eyes had been vivid green, unnatural, Hidan had gone looking for that color, and found its likeness only in an overgrown forest when the sun light glittered through leaves.

She had been as pale as he, and Hidan had clung to her. Once, her auburn mane of glittering ginger hair had been in likeness to his. Taking blood – taking the flux of a natural death – had given his hair the likeness to silver. It was just as well, in this way, his likeness to his brother could not be denied; both had startling silver hair, though silver and black was streaked within his brother's mane.

His mother had fled, and Hidan never knew why – though he had his suspicions, Hidan had never known his father. And his mother, beauty as she was, had been scorned for it. She had left, and taken the fragile life of his little brother away. In those early months, Hidan had felt it against his own heart, like the flutter of butterfly wings in his gently cupped hands, or a kitten's purr beneath soft fur. It hand been gentle, insistent – but it had been _there_ , always near him.

Then it had been taken away.

Hidan had been, from that day on, insistent to find his brother. Though he unreasonably – childishly, loathed his mother. It was not long afterward that he had been approached about training to be a ninja, and had agreed – seeing those skills as something inherently necessary. He had taken on a fierce bloodlust, for in his search he was constantly reminded, seeing first hand, how fragile human life was. How fragile his baby brother, not born, was. Would be. Still, he feared that he would find nothing, because maybe his brother had died in childbirth, or shortly after. Hidan would never know.

It was his singular driving fear; that he would _never know_.

Hidan had choked it down, smothered it; had killed for the sake of killing, to prove that he could feel death, if near enough. Had he not been near enough to his brother to feel that flutter-in-flux of life _begin_ , and _grow_ , by days – by months? Hidan had determined that his own blood would link his gift with his not-born brother, though there was no evidence of this. No proof but Hidan's own imagining and wishing.

Then his mother – _their mother_ – not even a year later, had died. Hadin had not even known why – or how. Yet, Hidan had felt it like a physical pain, an ache in his heart and sinking within his midsection, as if he had lost a limb. He had been forced abed, visions of green lights and dancing skulls and dark laughter haunting him. It had reassured him all the same, to his core he knew – he would not have _not known_ if his had brother died. He would have known. His brother was alive. Had to be.

Seventeen years passed in this way, with Hidan looking for a brother he had never set eyes upon, six years junior to his twenty-two. Yet despite the odds, it had not been, in the end, a _fruitless_ search; for Hidan _had_ found his nameless little brother. Streaked silver hair, green eyed, Harry Potter.

Not so nameless at all; in fact, quite _infamous_.


	2. Brother

O.o.O.o.O.o.O

_-Brother-_

O.o.O.o.O.o.O

A cloak, a wand, and a ring; it sounds like the beginning of a bad joke. Harry Potter would not disagree, if life is a joke, he thinks his…yeah; it's been a pretty _bad_ one. With his silver hair braided with black, pale skin of alabaster, and living green eyes; he looks impossibly ancient in a frail young shell. Harry knows most of all, appearances are deceiving. With the ring on his finger, with the cloak on his shoulders, with the wand in his hand – he is Jashin's.

His life is a joke - why?

It's never going to end.

"This isn't going to work; you know that – don't you?" Speak –no, don't even _think_ \- of Death, and it hears. Harry glances at the slender girl wrapped in silk. She smiles like he's being seduced; her colorless eyes are bleak and starless. There is nothing human in them; even so, Harry feels the urge to weep: he remembers them, always, as blue.

"It's worth a try." On tiptoes, she leans up in his face.

"It's worth shit, _ask me_ – I know." Harry finds the idea of falling even more in the debt of Death – distasteful, more so, dangerous. Temptingly so, Harry closes his lips against the questions plaguing him; _where is my brother – what have you done to him? Who has taken him, buried him away, why?_

There is no question which he could ask, which he could not find an answer for – here. He says nothing, looking away from her as if he can't see _her_ or remember when _she_ fell victim to the final mortal flaw.

"Fine, fine, you're stubborn, I _like_ that – you know I do, but there is a difference in stubborn and stupid, Harry – don't be stupid." When Harry looks, Death is gone. Harry clenches his hand around the wedding ring he wears, and thinks _Ginny_. It was Ginny's body which Death wore to mock him, with flaming hair and slender long limbs.

He has lost Ginny, has lost his unborn children, he's lost _so much_ for someone seeming so young – but his brother? He _will not_ lose his brother. Not for nothing, not for _anything_.

Harry stops mid-stride because he's reached a gate, and there is someone standing in his way.

"Welcome to Konoha, sir; your business here?" A shinobi – a _ninja_ they are called- masked and solid, is _standing in his way_. Harry tilts his head, and smiles in a way that someone would say is disturbed. The ninja does not sway out of his way, or flinch. Harry is almost disappointed, but he answers the question. It would not due to be impolite; Jashin, after all, has never been _polite_.

"Family, I would say." Harry is dressed all in black, but that means nothing to this nameless shinobi, here, the color of mourning is white.

"Very good, sir, and how long will your visit be?" Beneath the cloak, his shoulders shrug. He does not know, it will take as long as it takes.

"A day, no more – probably less..." Harry looks to the horizon, the sun is setting, but that means nothing to him.

"We hope you enjoy your visit." Harry looks into the man's eyes, unhidden and unhindered by the mask. He could know this mans name if he blinked, but he does not, because he _chooses_ not to – and so this man is safe from him. Harry smiles, and if the masked man has second thoughts, he wisely says nothing.

"I will." Harry purrs softly, and walks in. He knows he'll be watched, and does not mind – he wants to be. He wants these people to learn what happens when you mess with the _brother_ of Death's wizard.

With a twist of the ring, Harry knows the location of the guilty, for when murder is done – the dead know the name of the guilty, and scream for vengeance upon the living. So claims Jashin, who shares what he knows willingly with Harry. It rings in his head like a bell; _Shikamaru Nara_. If the boy has not killed his brother, not really – that is no matter – he has _as good as_.

 _'I've found you_.' Harry thinks in furious triumph, more fury then triumph – but both are there within him. Shikamaru Nara is staring up, puzzled, at the darkening clouds. As above, as below, Harry knows.

"Hello." Harry says, mockingly like Death himself. Harry, as a wizard, is as good as a force of nature unto himself; he can not be avoided or cast aside, but dealt with and lived through – or not – the choice of either is not yours. That is what it means to be a force of the nature of Death. Shikamaru turns to regard him, and it seems to take forever to meet the boy face to face. When they do meet, Shikamaru's eyes widen, and Harry takes one step forward.

"You _hurt_ my brother." He hisses, and flings his fingers forward from a curled fist.

Shikamaru is slammed into a tree, and his mouth gapes open– because he can't breath.

"W-who?" Shikamaru gasps, struggling uselessly. Harry sneers, and leans in closer to whisper in the other's ear, like a lover at midnight.

"Hidan, my mother's son, my elder brother – _where is he_?" Human eyes flicker with a hundred connections, a thousand thoughts, a dozen answers, a handful of clues - and all for naught, because the boy can't think and breathe.

Instead of answering, he shakes his head, brain caught in a loop – a trap.

"Impossible – you, you can't be." He gasps, and struggles like a butterfly pinned to paper, all for naught. Harry, despite his fury, becomes intrigued. Very few know him for what he is at a glance. But then, he has forgotten, this is a ninja – a shinobi: they know a wizard at first sight. Still, very few would even today think ' _wizard'_ at a glance from him.

"Can't be what?" Harry asks, flicking his eyes around, the people watching are becoming impatient with waiting for Shikamaru to save himself, to play some trick up his sleeve; they do not yet realize that Shikamaru can not be saved. Not from him.

"Real – you _have no shadow_. No soul, you're dead." Shikamaru shouts, in a rush, as if worried that Harry's attention will sway.

"No, not dead – far worse, _I am death_." Harry, as if to prove his words, takes the wand from his wrist halter and it grows and twists – a scythe, the metal presses against the throat of the Nara heir.

"Wizard" Shikamaru accuses with a sneer: _finally_.

"My brother, boy…." Harry does not put his force upon the blade of the scythe that had been a wand, he does not need to. He can eat this boy's life, his soul, just from where he stands – not touching, untouchable.

"My usefulness, hell – my life – may be forfeit once you know where he is, so…" Shikamaru does not finish, does not get the chance to, for Harry puts his finger to his lips, and the other finds he can not speak.

" _Shush_ , now." Harry looks around, and finds he is surrounded.

"Let him go." It's demanded by a blond with a familiar demon in him, and Harry smiles for that demon and shakes his head.

"Let me think now? No." Harry snaps finger and thumb together, and with that sound, he – and Shikamaru Nara – is gone.

Without the tree to support him, Shikamaru falls to the ground, reaching for his throat as if to keep away anything that might deprive him of air. It's a silly effort, but Harry watches him until Shikamaru is breathing normally, staring down at the ground, as if he does not want to look up and acknowledge what has happened to him. Harry can not give him that mercy.

"You will take me to him." Harry tells Shikamaru, as if there is no other purpose to the boy's life – and there might not be anymore, Harry recalls - if he fails to obey.

"No." Shikamaru protests, denies, and glares up at Harry as if this is _his_ fault – clearly the boy does not remember _who_ attempted to kill whose brother.

"We have time." Harry reassures silkily, and sitting suddenly onto the ground beside Shikamaru.

"You…you're a wizard." The ninja boy can't help but pull away; his very nature urges him to do so. Harry smiles at him, thinking of such instincts, primitive – but useful to unnerve the other boy. They are the same age, but the both of them have old minds, ancient eyes.

"Don't be silly, there are no wizards, it's a myth." Harry mocks. Harry pulls the scythe into a wand, curling his hand around the smooth wood and pressing hand and wand to the side of his face, as if he's too tired to keep his head up. Let the boy think Harry is tired by those small displays, that Harry has a weakness, and the boy a chance.

"No, no it's not – you are one, I don't know _how_ , but I do know a legend when I see one. You are, aren't you?" He doesn't ask as if he's insecure to his answer, but as if he expects Harry to deny it, to threaten the boy with a different truth – the one laid out between them; Harry has this boy's life – or death - in his hands. Some truths are easier to realize then the more imminent one.

"I suppose you think you're clever." Harry regards him, face to face, and finds himself mimicked; Shikamaru facing him and holding his head up with his hands, his arms upon folded knees.

"Naturally..." Shikamaru inclines his head, as if departing with a truth unseen.

"How…how did you survive?" Shikamaru does not quite look him the eye, so Harry knows this boy of the same age as he, is not without some respect and knowledge of him. Harry sighs, looking away.

"I did not. Not in truth. I am in the debt of Death, but I was not supposed to die – so I became…this. Jashin calls me a reaper, a deathless god of death, but he can not explain me – how I am the way I am." Harry's lips quirk in amusement, and when he looks aside from Shikamaru – like looking away from fire and flame – he sees Jashin come sulking out of the darkening wilderness.

"So you found him, big _whoop_. What's this boy going to tell you that I can't?" Death pouts, Harry knows, but you can hardly see such with the bushy beard he wares all around, like a tree.

"Who…who are you?" The only living mortal in the company of three asks, wide eyed and surprised. It's a look that does not suit him, but does, for who is not surprised in dying? Regardless, they answer at the same time.

"Death." Harry answers, dryly in what might be sarcasm.

"Jashin – and he's Harry." The big bodied giant of a man _chirps_ in an impossible voice, while Harry frowns at him.

"Is he…your boss?" Shikamaru asks in a whisper, leaning in close to Harry's ear.

Jashin laughs like he isn't sure he'll ever stop, in contrast, Harry silently shakes his head. Shikamaru can't help but think he's missing something. When the older deathless god of death finally regains his breath – not that he needs it – he speaks first. Harry allows him this, if out of nothing else then in respect to the fact that Hidan gains life from worship of Jashin: not that Shikamaru need know this as well.

"You kidding me, right - kid?" Jashin sighs, wiping tears from the corners of dark eyes. He looks first to Harry in the corner of his eye, as if he can not quite bring himself to meet the other's eyes, but whatever he sees there agrees with soothing the questions from Shikamaru's eyes.

"It's the other way around; green eyes here, he's so un-killable compared to me – and when you're a death god – not dying is kind of the point, you know? Death gods are what _his_ culture would call a Grim Reaper, a harvester of life and souls good and evil – I suppose for you, the closest you might come to understand us is as shinigami, death deities." Jashin taps a finger against the corner of his mouth, frowning as he stares into empty oncoming night.

Shikamaru shivers, wondering if the night is truly as empty as he perceives, and Harry catches his small movement and decides to do something about it – he taps the wand to the ground at an arms reach away, and breathes, and it seems like smoke or more reasonably, fog – but its not cold – and when Harry's breath reaches the point of his wand, sparks flare and a fire roars up. Flames lick up into the sky, as if to reach into the abyss – or light up the dark – Harry draws a circle around the flame and it does not cross that thin line in the dirt, for all that the fire seems to consume nothing else save air and dirt – it does not cease and die out. It is not, after all, a natural flame.

"How…?" Shikamaru can't help in asking, all his life it seems he's been bored, a genius unchallenged, without the motivation to seek out a challenge and then – _this_ – just drops into his lap. It seems impossible, or maybe there is a simple answer and he's only gone around the bend. That isn't nearly so hard to believe.

"Well, two things really – when Harry here died, he did it _big_ , not that he needed to – he was already practically _worshiped_ while still living. You see the stick, the ring, the cloak?" Jashin waits until Shikamaru nods, but it's when Harry gives him a glace and raised eyebrows wondering where Jashin is going with this, that he continues on as if he hadn't been waiting for any such signals.

"I may be older, but he's got Death's hallows – the original Death mind you – the holy items, you might say if you were the religious sort. Death's hallows all shinigami seek – for the sheer gall, raw power, and kicks and thrills. Bit of an adventure – or an obsession, you might say. Death literally followed the hallows, as us – shinigami – of course, that hardly stopped wizards from looking." Shikamaru and Jashin both peek at Harry, but if he cares what Jashin is talking about, he hides it very well.

"We shinigami couldn't really touch the Deathly hallows, you have to be mortal for that, because Death _gifted_ them to mortals, after all. You can't take a gift like that back, sort of like spitting in your own face, that. When Harry died, and as Harry had 'owned' them, the hallows followed him into becoming a death deity - we guess the hallows _like_ him and leave it at that, because not even Harry can _lose_ them if he tries, and he has believe you me! Those three humble hallows, combined with hundreds of magical hero-worshipers during his short life, and a prophesy that says that Harry can only be killed once by a man already dead and buried – his dust forgotten whose already had his fair share of chances, frankly guarantees he'll never, you know, be killed or just fade away. You my little mortal friend are looking as closely into the abyss as anyone can – this boy here is Death's heir, death in other words, incarnate on earth; and all but royalty – or as close as we shinigami come to it. What the noose is around your neck is, is this – are you ready?" Jashin pats Shikamaru on the shoulder, confidingly, but grinning as if he couldn't be more pleased with how pale the boy is. There is an inhuman threat to that eerie giant's grin.

He leans in close and whispers it.

"Death _gifted_ those hallows to Harry's great-great-grand daddy, they were are meant for Harry all along, hundreds of years of carnage and killing for those gems, guess why he wants his brother so bad – his _mother's son_? Makes you wonder, kid, who is their mother – your smart, don't worry, you'll figure it out." Jashin gives him an almost playful wink, but Shikamaru is all but baffled.

"You, in other words, really _screwed it up_ , if you know, you were hoping for a boring long life." Harry is _looking_ at Jashin, waiting, and when with a lurch of startling movement, the older shinigami looks back to meet his expression, it isn't pleased.

"Leave." One word, but it _feels_ like Harry just wants to lash out and kill Jashin, and Shikamaru has to wonder _– is that possible? Can you kill a death deity?_ Jashin hints that he himself can die, even being what he is. Evidently, whatever it is – death or _something else_ – Jashin can fear, for he stands shakily, and bows, never meeting Harry's eyes as he speaks.

"I humbly beg your apology; I was merely trying to assist you." With those words settling between them, Jashin as good as flees. He hadn't sounded like he was joking.

Leaving Shikamaru alone, usually, this would be ideal – his perfect solution for dull and troublesome happenings. Yet he finds himself uneasy, sharing an unnatural fire side with a deity of death, the offspring of Death, if Jashin – a shinigami – is to be believed. Who else would know better, though?

"I will not harm you." Harry says softly, as if it isn't a reassurance – merely fact.

"Thanks, for that." Shikamaru mutters, knowing that this isn't a favor Harry is paying him. Still, it is a chance, at redemption – at life. He's fair sure his after life (if there is such a thing) would suck if Harry was truly moved to hold a grudge against him.

"He had no place to tell you such things." Harry states, as he does everything else, passively. As if he just doesn't care about things the way anyone else would. It fascinates Shikamaru, that _lack_ of true life – of tired passion. The only hint that he had that there is something else under that persona is when Harry had gone after him for Hidan, but now that he has Shikamaru – what's he going to do with him? He wonders if Harry really knows, either.

"So, the question really is - _why_ did you let him?" When, this time, Harry turns to look at him, he seems surprised rather then threatening – Shikamaru is unspeakably grateful for that small pardon.

"That is not the _face_ of Jashin." The certain infliction that Harry puts on that word makes Shikamaru think that the word means _more_ then he thinks he does, closer to expression - appearance – or body.

"Whose body was he wearing, then?" Living green eyes are impossibly haunted, if it is possible for someone to merely have _hurting_ eyes, and leave no other trace or hint to expression, that is exactly what Harry looks like.

"My first friend, his name was Hagrid." Harry looks away, and Shikamaru is grateful again.

"He's dead?" Shikamaru closes his eyes the moment the words leave his lips, knowing it to be a stupid and tactless question.

"Yes." Harry answers very softly, and Shikamaru has to wonder if there is a question that Harry would _not_ answer, no matter how painful it must be to acknowledge.

"I'm sorry." Why it is that Shikamaru feels like a bumbling idiot, instead of a genius, he can't say. It might have _something_ to do with being what he believes is called 'tongue-tied' – but it feels more as if he's brain can not control what his mouth says.

"You could not do anything to have changed it, even if you had been there and tried to." Harry falls back on the grass, looking to the rolling sky above him. They follow him everywhere, those dreary black clouds.

"You can't be sure of that." Shikamaru doesn't know why he felt the need – the _necessity_ – of challenging those words, he just _does_. He's never felt this way – so alive – and right there, that is the irony of his life. That he only feels like he's truly living when sitting beside a deity of death incarnate.

Harry slips off the ring, looking at it and the dark sky above, its stone is darker still.

"Put this on." Harry rolls onto his side, facing Shikamaru and putting the ring between them challengingly. He doesn't know which of them is more surprised when Shikamaru does, slipping it onto his finger and meeting Harry's eyes the whole time.

The sky above is empty of thundering clouds without lightning, and below, no fire burns. No one is there at all.

"Where…where are we?" Shikamaru feels impossibility upon impossibility piling up around him, and it won't be long before he either accepts everything he sees or is broken by it. He stands inside a room of stone, filled with smoke, and he is not the only one there.

"My memory, my past." Harry answers softly from beside him. Shikamaru had, for a moment, almost forgotten him – he was too still, inhumanly so. Then again, Harry had never been human – a wizard, apparently (but did that count as human?) – But never normal.

"Is it real?" _Are we really in the past_? He wants to ask, but does not dare say. A giant enters the room, and Shikamaru recognizes him – Hagrid, the _real_ one – alive. ' _How'_ he wants to ask, and so much more besides, he's never felt so alive himself, he's never been baffled or challenged, it's always so tedious and boring – even being what he is, there are so few things that truly intrigue and interest him, but this – this impossibility, it's a lot like what he imagined _life_ truly being like, a adventure – never a dull moment. So much is out there, and with Harry, Shikamaru can touch it all.

Harry has opened up the world for him, like a flower unfolding for the light of the sun. He wants to know everything, see everything, because there is so much out there – and maybe Harry has seen everything, but maybe not – maybe Harry could be surprised alongside him – and wouldn't that be the rarest sight of all?

"Yes." It's so soft that Shikamaru barely hears the word, but when he does it brings back his focus, the reality he finds himself in. He wants to ask if Harry will be okay, but it's clear from the glance Shikamaru gets of him, that he _isn't._

Harry none the less surprises him by moving in close, draping his cloak over both their bodies. It somehow fits, and when Hagrid looks around, having heard whispers, he sees nothing. His eyes squinted, unconvinced that his senses had deceived him.

Out of the shadows at the other side of the room, where Hagrid wasn't looking, came Hidan.

"Don't take this personally." Hagrid still narrowed eyed in his surprise, turns quickly about, _quicker_ then such size reasonably would suggest a movement be made; Hidan is smiling his hands on a chain – when they meet face to face, that chain wraps itself around the width of Hagrid's waist – at it's tip is a scythe, the blade resting at his neck.

"But you've been outmatched, and in this bid, size _doesn't_ matter. So sorry, wizard." Hidan sneers, and if any part of him his 'sorry', it does not show. Hagrid struggles and snarls, and when Hidan twists his wrist in a movement that clearly makes the binding all that more tight and painful, Hagrid ceases moving – but not in despair – no, he is waiting.

Waiting for help, Shikamaru realizes.

"What do you want, _shinobi_?" The word is spat, a curse.

"The boy, of course..." Hidan's eyes roam the room, as if Hagrid might have stashed who he was looking for here. Shikamaru is aware he isn't breathing, he's holding his breath as the tension building – and finally breaks at Hagrid's words.

"The likes of you can't have him." Hidan is abruptly furious, because as far as he's concerned this man – this oaf of a half-giant – is the one obstacle standing in the way of what he wants; his one goal he's prayed for all his life, his brother.

"A pity you can't be of help to me, but fine, _fine then_ – say hi to Jashin for me?" A jerk of his fist, and the chain snaps, and the scythe runs through the body like a knife through butter – Hagrid does not even make a sound, it happens so quickly. Hidan stalks from the room, unknowingly leaving witnesses alive.

"He - that was _your friend_ , wasn't he?" Shikamaru says gesturing to the body, shaken, but not removing his eyes from the body on the floor and the spreading blood. Shikamaru had seen death before, being shinobi practically guaranteed the encounter; but not this cold slaughter – death was supposed to _mean something_ , be somehow between trained equals – for the greater good; _not this_. He shuddered, revolted, and was aware of Harry, so damned eerily still.

"Yes." A whisper he almost ignored, instead he spun to face the _wizard_ , disgusted by him for the first time since setting eyes on him.

"Then _why_ didn't you do anything to save him?" It was hissed at the taller boys neck, because Shikamaru had become suddenly aware –with those eyes measuring him now - of how much smaller he was, how much more vulnerable.

"He betrayed me." A small smile curled those lips, _pleased_ – and amused, that Shikamaru was so furious for the sake of one wizard. Shikamaru closed his eyes; counting slowly though the moments and memories, he had _never_ been so confused! It wasn't in his nature to _not_ know what was going on; he was after all a genius. Still – the _history_ of the man beside him was nothing but reflections dancing upon shadows– his thoughts raced, and things began to make sense; finally.

What he really needed was answers, and Harry had proven to reply faithfully with _a truth_ , but never, perhaps, the _whole_ truth. No, that was because there was _someone_ else involved here, and Harry would protect his elder brother by simply letting Shikamaru jump to conclusions with incomplete answers. Harry would let him think the worst of him, he didn't seem to care, but for Hidan…there was something he was missing, and it was so big he could almost see it overshadowing events.

"What is going on here?" Shikamaru didn't expect Harry to respond as he did, with action rather then word, but when Harry took off after Hidan, Shikamaru had to choose quickly between staying with a dead man, or following. He stepped swiftly after, unwilling to be left behind.

Somehow the stone room, seeming entombed in the earth, led to a balcony upon the heights of a castle. Below bright lights of differing colors, red and green and blue and more, were flung wildly and with propose between distant figures. They seemed so far away and yet too close. Shikamaru took a moment to realize what he was seeing.

"This is a…wizard war?" For the first time with Harry, he had answered his own question, and perhaps that was the point. Harry must have known he'd caught onto the truth of his not quite _complete_ answers; he wasn't going to answer anymore what Shikamaru could answer for himself.

"This is impossible, Harry you can't be this old – _the wizards_ – these people, they died out _before I was born_." If he expected a reaction, some comforting word or gesture, he received none.

"How long do you perceive seventeen years to be?" It wasn't the sort of question Shikamaru expected Harry to ask him, but it wasn't a joke. This wasn't some delusion because of the ring that he now wore because of a challenge, it was real, they were really here (wherever 'here' was) - for the first time he realized that with a jolt – and it left a fear that choked him into silence.

"Hidan would say he spent a lifetime, _his lifetime_ , trying to find me, he ignored boundaries he did not see or heed, and territories where being mortal can get you killed. He couldn't have done any of it alone, without Jashin, so you see I owe him a debt." It explained why Jashin had had such freedom, to have that sort of debt hanging over you and knowing it could be called in – and if Shikamaru wasn't missing something, there was a connection between Hidan and Jashin that Harry didn't dare interfere with.

"That doesn't explain how or why we are here – or how Hidan is." _Or was, as the case may be_ – Shikamaru corrects mentally, but he's taking everything in, and it's almost too much – and yet almost just enough.

His eyes focus on the man he's talking about, and Hidan is cutting though wizards and witches like they are nothing – the lights, the spells, he's realized – have no effect. Shikamaru can understand that, if nothing else, if Hidan used jutsu they wouldn't work on wizards, so it's why he's just slicing through them like he is. Everything has a counterpart, and so have a balance – and a shinobi balances a wizard, which is how they _know_ the other by instinct upon sight.

Shikamaru can lip read the words Hidan is saying, he says them often enough – over and over: " _Where is he!"-_ it's a shout, a scream, a battle cry.

And no one answers.

Shikamaru understands abruptly how lonely Hidan is, how desperate –it's a sickening sympathy to have with a murderer, his once-enemy. He also realizes just as suddenly that he _isn't_ alone in watching Hidan. There is a answering, no - _equal_ , loneliness in Harry, that longing is as strong as any bond between brothers, and it must be, to have survived…this.

There is a reason Harry wants him to see this, so he says nothing – he watches.

Hidan works his way though the blood, and at the center of it is…is Harry. No silver hair, but blazing green eyes and a wild mane of black, they find themselves face to face with each other, and some part of them must recognize each other in the same way that every wizard and shinobi does.

Hidan laughs, as Harry draws his wand – but Hidan only says two words that give this younger Harry pause.

"Mother's eyes…" Harry's eyes, their mother's eyes, are impossibly wide, his mouth gaps open and but he says nothing. Hidan snarls, as he looks about them – all around they are surrounded, he moves into a stance as if to put himself between Harry and all the rest. A man comes forward that both Harry and Hidan recognize – that much is obvious, he draws all their attention to himself. It isn't necessarily _positive_ attention- quite the opposite, but it is his.

"You gave your promise, that if I would kill _him_ , you would find my brother – lying cheat – if I had killed him, I would have killed my own little brother!" Hidan screams in defiance, and despite the bloodshed he's spread so thick, he's lusting for one last death.

Harry, the younger Harry – the little brother of this murder, is shaken and pale.

"From his brother's _own mouth_ he is guilty!" Bald and serpentine, the words are hissed but the only sound upon this battlefield.

"Harry Potter must die – he's is the blood of _his mother_ , of shinobi!" With a long finger, the shinigami beside Shikamaru traces the lighting bolt scar on his brow; it was a jagged silver memento. Shikamaru had wondered why this death deity, who seemed able to do so many impossible things, had not gotten rid of the very visible scar which could be perceived as a weakness, he knew now that Harry had his reasons – and they were likely painful.

There was no outcry of protest or agreement among the throng below, but they were – in this terrible moment – unified. It was obviously what the serpentine man wished, for his smile was full of malice for the two brothers.

The lights of a dozen spells –or more - are hurled at one individual, there is little that either Hidan or Harry could have done to avoid the unexpected barrage. Hidan does try, but it is too little – too late. On the dirt of the battlefield is his little brother, he cries out – dragging himself to Harry's side, taking his cold hand and screaming to the sky in protest, keening his pain unashamed to let all the world hear.

It's as if he expects an answer – and, indeed, there is one. A woman with flaming auburn red hair, like blood, is kneeling in black beside them. She is just there, as if she always has been – and always will be.

"My sons," her words echo in every ear, she touches Hidan's cheek, brushing away the tears there.

Harry is stirring between them, and when he sees her, he's still – as if he thinks that if he moves, she will flee, never having been there at all. Her eyes are the green of living things, and if fire is meant to mean destruction and death, there is a force in life that makes fire bow to be only the renewal of green things, the remover of the old, so youth would have room to grow.

"How..? I…I felt you leave us, mother." Hidan pulls her attention away from Harry, as if to protect him.

"My boys," she breaths, as if she lives for this moment, this day, and he realizes that in a very real way – she does, "I haven't much time, I have moved onward, beyond, without you; I am so very sorry to have abandoned you – I meant to raise you both beside me. I had to hide you, my Harry, for while a shinobi will always know a wizard, it is not so of wizards – to know shinobi. I had hoped to protect you, I have always been beside you, and you are everything I have hoped for, a noble protector." She sadly traces the lighting bolt scar, tears shine on her cheeks.

"A weapon, you mean - am I a weapon, mother?" Her forehead touches his as she brings his head next to hers.

"Never, son of mine – never merely that, so much more then a tool – do not let them trick you to think otherwise." The words must seem to be meant a whisper for Harry alone, but every ear hears her words, as if they _can't help_ but hear her. As if they were meant to.

"Lily Evans, I killed you." Serpentine eyes don't flinch from the living green fire of death, he steps forward, wand raised as if to do it again.

"Tom Marvolo Riddle, do you think it so easy to slay what I am? I am not merely an idea, and whimsy element of nature – I am inevitable, I am the end of the beginning and the beginning of the end; I am Death." She stands, elegant and graceful with every sinister movement; she steps forward, shielding her children from harm. "I am their mother, and I am not a mere mortal; you will learn well what that means this day. You have hurt my sons. I end you now." Her finger pointed at him in this declaring, and he burned to embers – the wind scattering his still burning ashes. Like fire, it spreads and catches, and wizards and witches scatter, screaming – attempting to flee her wrath. None succeed. She spares one glance behind her, and smiles softly to see her sons' safety, and still smiling she fades – as if she had never stood there at all.

Evidence of her presence is all around them, in the swirling clouds of dust and the burning grass.

Shikamaru takes a shuddering breath, drawing his focus away. He looks to his hand; it's clenched into a white fist. It's shaking, but he isn't cold. He is afraid – terrified, and yet – it's like _this_ is what he's been waiting for all his life.

Proof - in immortals, in gods; in _something more_ then human, in a reason why. Harry looked to the horizon, as if sharing a secret thought; and Shikamaru dared not disturb him, or he'd lose all the little threads that were needed to tie up the mystery, the truth.

Shakily, he hands Harry his ring, the silence enfolding them. Harry twists it once, and they stand where Hidan is buried. Harry kneels in the dirt, taking his cloak and laying it full length on the ground. He closes his eyes, and it's as if Shikamaru can hear his thoughts.

 _Where are you, brother_? Slender fingers danced over the cloth, reaching and searching.

It's as if the earth is heaving up the remains, and something is breathing out and in underneath the cloak. From below, the cloak is snatched off; Hidan is – of course- beneath.

" _Finally.._!" Hidan snarky and sarcastic is Hidan at his best – he sees Harry, and continues, grinning.

"You have no idea how damn boring… _you!_ " Hidan ceases speaking abruptly, and he's glaring at Shikarmaru who has no small suspicion _he's_ the reason for the sudden silence.

Hidan sneers at him- the outsider in this little brotherly reunion, the elder is looking very displeased.

"Brother," Harry greets softly. He's not grinning or looking pleased with himself or anything of that like – still, Shikamaru can't help but feel used. Like it's some sort of game between Hidan and Harry, and Harry just made an unexpected move.

"I'm going to _kill you_!" Hidan lunges for Shikamaru, his bony hands stretching for his neck. He looks like a starved man, Shikamaru jolts away, but Hidan follows, hands clenching and unclenching with a longing to wrap around his throat. He looks almost surprised when Shikamaru gets out of the way.

"What did you expect?" Shikamaru mocks, anger fueling him as he twists and dodges away. They are rolling in the dirt, jutsu forgotten along with all the skills of shinobi; they are simply trying to kill and not be killed – survival.

"You killed _my mentor_ – he was expecting a baby, you know? – you made his child an orphan!" Hidan has him pinned, and then he stops, frowning down at Shikamaru as if he isn't sure if he's being lied to.

"Well _sorry_ , how was I supposed to know?" Hidan may be sarcastic, but his regret in making an unborn child an orphan is plain to see – Shikamaru finds he's surprised. Hidan is a manic, a freak with a thing for slaughtering people – but not, apparently, a murderer in cold blood- or a heartless monster. Even he can see the connection between the unborn child and Harry.

Hidan risks a glance at Harry, trusting Shikamaru to stay put. As he doesn't see anyway to move without dislodging the man straddling him, he complies – but doesn't like it at all.

"What did you do to him?" Hidan asks softly, and Shikamaru looks up enough to see Harry – which is the only 'he' who Hidan could mean, he's sitting back waiting for them to get over and work out the fact that the one man Shikamaru admired was killed by Harry's brother, who Shikamaru then tried to blow up. He succeeded in the blowing and burying part – not so much the killing-the-murdering-son-of-a-bitch bit.

The son-of-a-bitch, who happens to be Death, Shikamaru remembers only then.

 _Shit_.

"Uh, nothing – I swear!" Hidan scowls like he's considering punching Shikamaru in the face on the off chance that he's mistaken.

"Are you done, brother?" Harry has never sounded so tired.

"I suppose…" Hidan seriously looks like he's considering re-thinking that later, so Shikamaru, for once, knows when to shut his mouth.

"Very good, we have a problem." Harry stands, and Shikamaru sees Death – his mother – in his graceful and sure movement.

" _What_ …?" Hidan whines only a little, drawing out the word like Harry is ruining his fun; Hidan might be the elder, but Harry is most assuredly more mature – maybe dying does that.

"Your Akatsuki has returned Tom Marvolo Riddle to this earth. Incase you have forgotten, brother _:_ in prophesy, _and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives_." Hidan lets out a bark of laughter at the end of Harry's recital, while Shikamaru doesn't think _that_ the least bit appropriate, because the last thing Konoha (not that either brother cares about his village – but _Shikamaru_ does) needs is _another_ snake face.

"Well, _little brother_ , I don't see the problem – you're the living dead, and I'm the living that can't die." Hidan doesn't sound particularly pleased with what he says, but its fact all the same to him.

"Be that as it may, I would rather be _living_ then a shinigami…" Hidan sighs, glancing down at Shikamaru beneath him before standing up clumsily, he looks again to Harry and everything for a moment about him seems to soften just a little bit.

"Fine, fine, we'll go play with Tommy boy and try to fix you so you're alive and kicking– _again_." Hidan waves a hand absently back and forth as if dismissing what is clearly important to both Harry and him as frivolous, walking (or rather, stumbling) off for parts unknown, or perhaps only known to him. Shikamaru sits up to watch him go, and when Harry offers his hand to get up – he takes it.

"You should go home." Harry tells him, and there is something so earnest in it that it makes Shikamaru take a second look at the taller man.

"Nah, I'm good." Shikamaru's grip on his cold hand tights to reassure him- this is what he wants; to be beside Harry, at the center of something his genius barely grasps – to be challenged in ways he has never understood that he needs a challenge before, he does something then that he's never done before winking at the taller boy in all-out mischief.

"I said you should, not that I want you to." Harry reassures in his own way, and Shikamaru is pulled along in his wake, as his shadow, as Harry follows Hidan. He'll be Harry's shadow, because Harry doesn't have one.

He's okay with that.

O.o.O.o.O.o.O

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Much like the first four pages of before (AKA, first chapter: 'Buried' and this is as LONG as that was SHORT) I have no idea where this is really going or what's going on either - other then the obvious. I haven't really written anything in -oh - two months, my gawd.
> 
> Much thanks to GrimmHearts who asked about a story I'd sort of figured for 'oneshot' and made it come to life, because I can't help 'what ifs'
> 
> Dedication: for Phantom Thief Kyuubi, who asked for something like this, where Harry has a brother; Hidan.


	3. -Birth-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Merry Christmas/Happy New Years to both GrimmHearts and KingofLoosePages both of whom requested for Christmas another chapter of this story, so here you both are.

O.o.O.o.O.o.O

_-Birth-_

O.o.O.o.O.o.O

"Not that I'm complaining," Shikamaru says three hours later, trying for bored but sounding nervous, "but where are we going?" As he's addressing this question to Hidan, Shikamaru feels he has the right to feel uneasy. Such feelings are proven true.

Hidan stops abruptly and pivots to meet him face to face, his sneer is disgusted.

" _Why_ would I tell you, Konoha rat? If I tell you, and you run, and by miracle escape _mother dear_ , we," Hidan gestures to Harry and back to his chest, "would have Konoha after our asses."

"Has he tried to run away?" Harry asks out of thin air and Hidan sort of cringes, as if he's about to be lectured.

"No." Hidan answers and Harry meets his brother's eyes.

"He's not going to." Harry reassures softly, and Hidan glances at Shikamaru suspiciously, and then frowns.

"Why?" Hidan asks, and it's clear enough to Shikamaru that Hidan has found something has changed about Harry since the last time Hidan was above the earth, Shikamaru remembers well Hidan's soft accusation: " _What did you do to him_?"

Shikamaru wishes he knew, and wonders if it isn't something that Harry has done to him too.

Harry tilts his head and meets Shikamaru's eyes briefly, and then they flick away.

"We interest him." Hidan raises a brow at Harry, and then lets out a short bark of laughter. It's crude and Shikamaru doesn't have to be a genius to guess at what Hidan is thinking his ' _interest'_ is in; his hands clench into fists at his side.

"Remember this, Shikamaru, curiosity killed the cat." Hidan turns back around, leading them again, but he's close enough to hear the retort when it comes.

"Satisfaction brought it back." Shikamaru near sing-songs, but he doesn't know why he's doing this – as good as baiting Hidan. This time he's ignored, and Shikamaru feels partly abandoned and justified.

"Is there really prophesy between you and Orochimaru..?" _Tom Marvolo Riddle_ , Death with burning hair and living green eyes had named him; but it was not the name Shikamaru was familiar with _._

"Do you _ever_ stop asking questions?" Hidan growled back at him, but it lacked bite.

"The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches ... born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies ... and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not ... _and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives_ ... the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the seventh month dies _..._ " Harry retorts, in a voice far away.

"Wait – wait, did you just say _Orochimaru_?" Hidan had spun around to face Shikamaru, but he continued walking - backward. Cautiously, and with a glance to Harry, he nods.

"How does _he know_ , Harry." Hidan stops walking either direction and asks – but this is no question, it's a demand, and Harry looks up to face him.

"I gave him my ring." Hidan is looking down at Harry's hand – at the ring around his middle finger – a wedding ring gold with a ruby stone, and there is a pained look on his face that Shikamaru isn't accustomed to seeing there.

"Oh little brother…" Hidan reaches out for that hand, as if to touch Harry – but he doesn't, instead he puts his hand over the ring – not quite touching it –hovering over it, protecting it. As if it's fragile and valuable; this isn't the ring with a stone darker then the night sky, one of Death's Hallows – no, this is something else.

"What's wrong?" Shikamaru can't help but ask, feeling as if he's done something terrible and wrong and hadn't known or realized any of it until just then.

"He was _married_." Hidan grits out between his teeth, his voice pained; and Shikamaru frowns – his confusion plain to see.

"What has that to do with me?" Shikamaru takes a step back, feeling lost and out of his depth.

"When a wizard and witch marry, they open themselves to one another – magic, mind, memory – it all gets mixed; to some lesser extent, _all of them_ were bound together by their magic. _Think_ about it, kid, you saw it – he died married, and when he woke up, mother dearest killed them all; _she_ was gone." Harry's eyes are far away, as if he's living what Hidan is saying.

"Can you imagine living on and on endlessly for _one person_ –someone like me, for the sake of family?" Shikamaru mutely shakes his head. Hidan laughs, like he doesn't believe it either, even though he does it for Harry.

"You saw into his memories; you _know_ Hagrid betrayed him, and I killed Hagrid – you _know_ I knew Orochimaru, promised to kill Harry Potter to find my brother; you _know_ what I am – Akatsuki. I wonder genius – can you connect the dots yet?" Hidan leans his forehead against Harry's, closes his eyes when Harry doesn't see him.

"Orochimaru knew I hunted for my brother – and I only had to kill some wizard for him, after what I've done, that price? It was cheap; Hagrid was to give me the boy I was to kill. Harry's told me about Hagrid, a good guy, as half-giants go – he only ever wanted one thing; he wanted beasts to be people. You can imagine his surprise when one spoke to him and agreed – and for a price, the beast Manda wanted to meet the great wizard Harry Potter. Hagrid arranged it, and in doing so betrayed Harry." Hidan still has his eyes closed, so doesn't see when Harry's eyes focus on him and he smiles forgiveness for his brother.

"He saved me – and you –a funny way of betraying someone." Hidan takes a sharp relived breath at Harry's words. Opening his eyes to see that smile, Hidan can't help in grinning back.

"There you are, thought I'd have to go in there after you." Hidan to his credit doesn't shudder, but neither does he looked pleased at the thought. He taps one finger to the side of Harry's head to make his meaning clear.

"That would be unwise." Harry says, deadpan.

"Wait, how did Orochimaru – I mean; Tom Marvolo Riddle know Harry?" Hidan takes a step back from Harry and sighs looking up at the clear blue sky. Harry looks to Shikamaru and knows the question was one they both know the answer to –it's a distraction, to get them away from Harry's loss.

"Before I was born, Tom Marvolo Riddle was already a wizard struggling to escape mother, he split his soul into what we call Horcrux, and he has done this seven times since. This Hallow ring was once one, a diary he had growing up that I destroyed before I knew what it was, a Hufflepuff founders cup – a Slytherin's locket, a Ravenclaw's diadem, my own living body – and his own shredded soul within him– all these had a shard of his soul, all were destroyed." Shikamaru shudders, for the last two he'd seen the death of; was that the reason Harry's mother had let him die, so Tom Marvolo Riddle would die with him?

"There was the eighth Horcrux, and this he put into his familiar, a snake we called Nagini. It is _that_ which you call Orochimaru – a demon which takes fragments of the name T **om** **Mar** v **o** lo **R** iddle and Ga **u** nt; the 'chi' would be a mocking of life, would it not?" Harry addresses this last question to Hidan, who nods eyes dark and lips pressed in a tight line.

"How do you know Orochimaru is a demon?" Shikamaru asks, and Harry looks to the dark Hallow ring as he answers.

"The making of Horcrux is most distasteful in shattering a living soul; a dark enough art to put one in an inanimate object, but to put it into a living being? It is the crafting of demons – in the way that a shinobi knows and hates a wizard and witch, we _know_ demons." Shikamaru swears his heart skips a beat, and Hidan looks quickly to him as if he senses it.

"Then, if wizards can create demons –are them, in a way, did wizards create the shinobi?" Shikamaru asks, feeling overwhelmingly baffled for a genius.

"In a way, when Death took them, it left a void that the shinobi have filled until we…" Harry pauses, and Shikamaru _gets it_.

" _We_ \- you said, _we_." Shikamaru's voice breaks, but he sees the smile playing on Hidan's lips.

"Ah, I get it now. Congratulations kid, you're wizard-born, the first since Ororchimaru – I guess." Shikamaru starts to shake his head – in denial? In disbelief? – he doesn't know, but when Harry finally looks up to meet his eyes, he knows the truth, and says it just to be sure of the sound of truth in it.

"I'm a wizard." Hidan tucks an arm around his shoulders and what should be a gesture of comfort feels strange (hadn't this same man sworn to tear out his throat _with his teeth_ alone?) it's too close and personal in a way that Shikamaru would rather keep distance between them. Hidan isn't Harry, and of course Shikamaru knew that, but it's _more_ then that Hidan isn't _like_ him, isn't _like Harry_ – isn't _a wizard_.

"Ah, at last, it all makes sense now – doesn't it, kid? Little brother is like that, mysterious random strangers and happenings make for cosmic balance – gets that from mommy dearest, he does. For a while there you had me nervous, Harry – thought you were going to bed the kid, and – well, he's a _kid_ , couldn't have that, could we Shikamaru?" Hidan ruffles Shikamaru's hair, and that's when it happens, just like with Harry he sees into this mans memories, only it's not the same; there is a distance between them that anchors Shikamaru – he knows what he sees isn't real, or that it is real – for Hidan – but it's a memory that unfolds before his eyes.

_It was Hidan's first visit to a temple of Jashin. He knotted his fingers together, narrowed eyed – clear enough he wasn't impressed. Hidan had ventured here –first - because old villagers whispered of blood magic, finding, leeching life, of the dead, of those yet born; or reviving the dead. This clustered temple was better called a cabin, a wooden ill kept shrine; its members were three; a black eyed man, a black haired woman, and a black skinned man. Each wore orange-blood robes and something about them spoke of age, it was a persuasive grey that clung to every slowly thought out movement; like ash seeped into their fragile bones._

_It annoyed Hidan, they asked no questions of him, only asked he be silent. None the less, Hidan had obeyed them, sitting cross-legged, silent as bones were thrown - and tea was sipped._

_"You look for one who is of your blood?" A blood red tongue slipped between wrinkled lips, moistening them._

_"Yes." Hidan answered, for that much even if that had no ability, they would know._

_It was in a temple that Hidan glimpsed truth. Jashin, his God, had heard the prayers of a man who had not forsaken his brother in his heart of hearts. For all the evils Hidan had done all his life – he is forgiven them; redemption is within his brother to give._

_"You will find him if you deal life-for-life with the serpent, be warned your word will be broken." The black eyed man's eyes winked in amusement. Hidan knows a shinobi's word is often all that matters in the world, sometimes – but if he must forsakes it, and his reward is his brother? What does it matter? It is a small price in honor to pay._

_"Very well." Hidan bites the words out, as if they do not matter._

_"Your brother is the father of demons, though he knows it not. Fear not, he will be reborn into something of Death's making, and he will live a long life." The pale knuckles of the black man fold and unwrinkled as he takes a bone into his hand and rolls it again._

_"You must give yourself to Jashin, a deal – your hand will deal out death in his name, and however many years flee from the dead will be partly yours to claim - to add upon your own. In this way you can save the brother of your blood you will find." And this, Hidan knows, is the truth – and the price of what he asks._

_"I accept." Hidan says with ringing finality and the three are gone, seated in their place is a grinning shinigami, the rolled bones – his fate played out in-between them._

_"Then kill them all." Jashin circles his finger once around the room, Hidan raises from the floor, bows once to the shinigami, then unsheathes his three-bladed scythe as he steps from the temple door. Surrounding the temple is the village he has grown up in._

_Hidan says nothing as he obeys._

When Shikamaru opens his eyes, Harry is in-between Hidan and him, and that seems right and true, as if this is as much Harry's fate now, as it was Hidan's to deal with Jashin then. His head is aching as if it's being split open, and he cradles it. Hidan merely shakes his head, as if ridding himself of the memory and its feelings (and that Shikamaru saw into his head, which is supposed to be something impossible and secret) is that easily done.

"What was that – what happened there, just then?" Shikamaru asks, but is Hidan who answers.

"Harry's memories aren't like anyone else's, when you're in them, the past – you're really there. It's happening. Wizard's memories, I call 'em, guess I'll have to watch myself now that there is more then one wizard running about." Hidan offers Harry a sort of rueful look, as if he should have known better – and that doesn't make sense to Shikamaru, because how could Hidan have known better – what Shikamaru might see in his head, what experience did they share that would _make sense_ of this?

"So I can see people's memories – just like that?" Harry looks down at his Hallow ring, and Shikamaru has to wonder that maybe this is just a lingering side-effect.

"Once, wizards and witches had a way to control what they remembered and shared with others, collected into a Pensieve _,_ silvery stands of thought they looked like." Harry says, and Shikamaru has to wonder how far his mind is going to take before it breaks with just what Harry says so easily and simply, as if he's believed it all his life and can think of no other way to live but as a wizard.

"Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall;

Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.  
Threescore men and threescore more,  
Can't place Humpty Dumpty as he was before." Jashin sings as he comes toward them on the path behind, as if it should be obvious he's been following them all along. This time he's red headed and freckled and Harry can't look at him.

Shikamaru wonders who the rhyme refers to – him – or Harry - or if it really matters after all. Hidan takes a step forward as if to stand between Harry and Jashin, who doesn't even seem to notice as he sidesteps him and heads straight for Harry like a magnet. Harry still can't – or won't – look at him, but that doesn't give Jashin pause – in fact, he grins at Harry as if pleased by the response he's invoked.

"You should know," Jashin says with a grin, tilting Harry's chin up to meet his eyes, "there is a demon on his way."

"Kyuubi." Harry agrees, as if he doesn't even have to ask.

"Indeed." Jashin frowns, gaze flicking to Hidan who straightens as if to draw in the death deities attention.

"I would think on what it means for your little brother if you succeeded." Is it a warning – or does Jashin actually _care_ what happens to Harry? Shikamaru can't read him, mostly because every time he meets Jashin the shinigami wares a different face.

"What is that supposed to mean?" Shikamaru snaps, because hanging out with near-immortals with a history that dances tauntingly just out of his reach is evidently bad for his temper.

" _Think_ about it kid, Death _brought_ Harry back – and only Harry can kill Tom, who is to say that when Harry succeeds, Death won't _take Harry back_?" Harry runs his forefinger up and down the smooth Elder Wand, his eyes flick to Jashin as if considering a duel. Shikamaru has to wonder if that can be done – not shouldn't be done – _can_ be done; and what would happen if it did. It's the middle of a summer day, and the chills down his spine shouldn't make him sweat and shiver in dread.

"You need not worry over Mother taking me, Jashin. If after, you try to tie my brother here for your use, you'll be following." His mother's living green eyes flash to death god black – and flashes green once again, it's as if Harry blinked, and then that trace of base creature is gone.

Jashin bows his head not meeting those eyes, even as he grins at the threat.

"Just remember _who_ your brother bargained with to be beside you." Harry is very still, and it is Hidan who flinches. It's clear now that Jashin had meant to provoke Harry in this way.

"Be grateful I do not take back my word, Hidan." Jashin hisses to the elder brother, and even Shikamaru can hear the ' _as you did not keep yours'_ hanging in the air. As if Hidan's strings have been cut to keep to upright, his knees fold beneath him and he lays face to the dirt on the ground.

"My God, please." Hidan is _pleading_ , and Jashin is only then satisfied – his eyes on Harry who is so still he might as well be pretending not to be there. Shikamaru can't swallow past the knot in his throat – this is _wrong_ , even he can see that.

"You will kill for me." Jashin purrs, his fingers running though Hidan's hair, his eyes lock with Shikamaru, who has never been so very aware of his own mortality.

"I live to kill for you, my God." Hidan agrees in monotone, and it strikes Shikamaru that Jashin isn't making Hidan do anything – he's doing it of his own free will, to keep adding years to his lifespan.

 _For him_ , Shikamaru realizes eyes flicking frantically to Harry who stands and does nothing, helplessly.

"Jashin." Harry hisses in protest, softly.

"This is not necessary; you have made your point." Harry does not look to Hidan, and Hidan is carefully not looking toward Harry - or Shikamaru.

 _He's ashamed of this – sickened_ , Shikamaru realizes as he watches, voiceless.

"Have I? Have I _really_? On the contrary, Harry – this is a very _necessary_ lesson, your dearly beloved brother is mine, and through him – so are you." Jashin trails his finger down Harry's cheek, and though Harry leans into it as if to enjoy the caress, Hidan must see what they are doing in the corner of his eye – he flinches as if pained by an unseen blow.

Jashin kisses Harry on his silver lightning bolt scar.

"Give the kid your wand, Harry." Jashin murmurs in Harry's ear, fingers threading through the thick black and silver mane. Harry's been fingering his Hallow wand all this time- and Shikamaru has been wondering if he's going to do something – when he's going to do something, he is gripping it now so hard his knuckles have turned white with the pressure, but he tosses it toward Shikamaru – it lands on the dirt at his feet.

Shikamaru doesn't touch it, tries not to look at it, but something about it calls to him.

"Pick it up, kid – and thank Harry, would you? He's beaten, and he's been dead a very long time, haven't you Harry? It's to be your very first wand, give it a whirl." Shikamaru starts to shake his head in denial, of taking the wand – of Harry being beaten or dead, but Harry only meets his eyes and gives a single accepting nod.

Shikamaru kneels in the dirt, his hand is shaking as he takes the wand and it grows warm in his hand, at Jashin's prompting look, he gives it a shake. Multicolored sparks, like a fire-work fountain pour from the tip, they sting like bees and burns when they touch his skin, but Shikamaru says not a word.

His eyes are on Harry, who bows his head to Shikamaru, as if subservient to him. Jashin's laughter is full of outright delight.

"Death won't dare take you now, Harry my love." Only then does something about Harry seem to break.

" _Go away_." Shikamaru growls, Harry's – no, his? – Hallow wand pointed to Jashin's heart. It shakes in his hands.

The laughter is mocking as it echoes in his ears, but Jashin is gone when he blinks.

Hidan already on his feet in front of Harry, so quickly it might have been a false memory to think he'd ever been prone on the ground at Jashin's feet, save his shaking hands are smeared with dirt as he cradles his brothers blank face in them.

"Harry? _Harry_ answer me, damn you - what do you want me to say? I'm _sorry_ , I'm _so sorry._ " Hidan presses his forehead against Harry's as tears trail openly down his cheeks.

"Listen, I'll make this better, I swear – I'll kill the brat and the wand will be yours again – it's what Jashin wants, for you to kill another wizard, that's all it is." Hidan glances to Shikamaru and there is the look of a cold blooded murder in his eyes.

"Why?" Shikamaru chokes, with Hidan set against him and the Hallow wand in his hands; it's only a matter of time until he's dead. The question pulls at Harry, as he'd hoped, and an answer falls from a still face.

"Sometimes the dead just die, sometimes they become ghosts, and sometimes they are the shinigami." Shikamaru remembers how Death killed those wizards and witches – an entire race, and thinks _Of course, how could there not be a death deity rising like a phoenix from that_?

"Was he – Jashin, a wizard?" Shikamaru asks quickly, knowing his time may soon be up with Hidan eyeing him and the Hallow wand in his hands.

"What do you think _genius_?" Hidan sneers, his disgust twisting his tears. Fury for Harry's sake mask his features, his agony in hurting Harry – in being his brothers weakness.

"I think you haven't been asking him the _right questions_ , think yourself – damn it, Hidan, stop and think – will you? Jashin always looks like one of Harry's _dead_ friends, who would want you not to die, Harry? Who _loved_ you?" Harry is looking at Shikamaru, but his eyes are far away, Hidan takes a threatening step forward but the name Harry next utters stops him in his tracks.

"Ginny." _His wife_ , Shikamaru is sure.

"No." Hidan snarls, waving a hand as if to cut Shikamaru's words apart. It's too late, because Harry has heard them, and they look to have dug into his heart and taken root. Shikamaru can only hope he can influence what blooms.

"You don't know what you're doing, Shikamaru Nara." Hidan is cold and deadly, and Shikamaru is sure he's going to die soon.

"Shut up, will you? I _think_ I do." Shikamaru bites back, because fear of _his_ death is one thing, fear of Harry losing all hope is worse.

Clapping sounds in his ears, and out of the shadows in the trees walks Jashin, swaying and long legged – a red haired woman who must be related to the man who'd 'he' had taken the form of before. Shikamaru had only ever seen the shinigami as a man, so hadn't remembered – the gods don't have fixed sexes.

"Very good, kid, careful – if you break him, I'll see you dead." Jashin sounds pleased and intrigued with what Shikamaru is doing, but his only hope is if Harry had been listening. Hidan is still and furious, looking between Harry and Jashin, who only have eyes for each other.

"This isn't helping him, you think it is – _look_ at him!" Hidan howls at Shikamaru, as if being mortally wounded.

"Why?" It's rare of Harry to question, but he does in this.

"She killed me Harry. I won't let her have you. I won't let her take you away from me. _Never_." Harry takes a step forward, closer, as if Jashin is drawing him in. In a way, Shikamaru guesses, the shinigami is doing just that.

"Harry, _Harry - no_!" Hidan snarls, seeing before Shikamaru does.

Every step closer, Shikamaru realizes with a sickening jolt, and Harry looks _dead_. His skin has always been pale, but now it shines as if his bones are burning within him. It isn't natural, the way Harry seems to flicker and blur at the edges.

"You'd use my brother against me, Ginny?" Harry asks, his hand rising weakly as if to touch her cheek. His hand falters at her words.

"I'd use anything and _anyone_ , Harry my love. You do not breath and your heart does not beat, you as if are froze but a moment from Death's embrace, but be sure, the dead can not feel as you do now." Jashin's eyes flicker and she blinks as if tears would fall from her eyes. Harry's hand brushes her cheek, as if to smear tears only they can see.

"Harry," Hidan growls out as if in agony, " _stop_ this."

 _He's seeing his brother – his brother who's supposed to be the forever living dead, dying_. Shikamaru feels sympathy well up in him, even as he watches and can not look away. This is something he's never seen, it's unique and terrible and beautiful. He wishes to stop it, to deny it, to turn away – but he can do nothing, say nothing – as if there isn't any more for him to do then this, to witness.

Harry's eyes meet Hidan's and his not is slow and thoughtful.

Jashin kisses him, and Harry burns and flickers like a dying heartbeat.

"I forgive you, I love you." Harry says between one kiss and the next, Jashin pulls him against the curve of her body, and it's like watching a fire catch – Harry's shining skin spreads to hers, and they both burn and flicker like candles going out.

"Thank you." Jashin whispers and Shikamaru must close his eyes between the brightness of them. Jashin is falling away into nothing in Harry's arms, like sand in an hourglass, and he holds her as they burn away like ash together – something is taking them away from here.

Shikamaru cries out a wordless defiant _No_!, but it's Hidan who snakes a arm around his brother's neck – holding him close so he's solid and real and _there_ , even as Jashin burns to ashes like Death had done to Ginny before and Harry does do Jashin now, ashes falling onto his arms and chest and the ground at his feet.

"Easy, easy, it's okay." Harry is wide eyed and watching nothing but the ashes, lost to memory as he clings to Hidan as if he's the only thing real. Harry says nothing makes no sound and does not weep – and that most of all is unnatural and wrong.

Hidan frantically kisses his mixed silver and black hair and the silver scar as Harry's skin stops burning, going cold and still and white like snow. It's as if Hidan is reminding Harry how to be real again.

"You did it, Harry – I'm free, I won't have to kill for that…again." Hidan falters at 'that', and Shikamaru wonders what he would say if he didn't have Harry to listen –more years with you, god, monster, shinigami, your wife? All are equally true and awful.

Harry's eyes meet his, and they aren't empty, but shining as if he's forgotten how to cry and still burns inside. Hidan, his brother – isn't enough.

"Do something – you're a wizard." Hidan mutters into Harry's skin and Shikamaru doesn't know if it's to Harry or to him, but he moves forward to obey as if a moth drawn to the flames once invited.

Shikamaru enfolds Harry's waist in his arms, head at Harry's listening for a heartbeat that never comes.

"Who was Jashin, before Ginny?" Shikamaru asks when Harry closes his eyes, and Shikamaru does not know if he sleeps or listens, but he is heavy and real in his arms and that's all that matters.

"Ron, Ginny's older brother – Harry's best friend." Hidan answers and Shikamaru does not think to question how he knows.

"Why make me take Death's Hallow, the wand?" Shikamaru at once feels young, at the look Hidan gives him.

"Do you think mother dearest wouldn't take Harry if he _asked_ to die?" There is scorn there, but it hides Hidan's own fears and worries.

"No – why would…" Shikamaru ceases to speak, his eyes on the golden ashes that mar Harry's clothes. They haven't come off Harry, as if Jashin sought to mark him even in a final death.

"Harry has only ever fought as a wizard. The Hallows are his weapons. Now one is lost to him." Hidan eyes the Hallow but makes no move to take it from him, so Shikamaru does, offering it feely for Hidan to take even as the wand is warmer and seemingly more alive then Harry in his arms.

"Can't I give it back?" Shikamaru asks, for Hidan has made it sound as if Harry is helpless, and he's seen for himself only moments ago that Harry _can_ die. The thought fills him with fear, and he wonders what it makes Hidan feel.

"No, he'd have to kill you for it – or I could do it for him. Harry wouldn't do that, wouldn't let me, with his head straight on." Shikamaru doesn't know if it is pride or irritation that Hidan means to show, or perhaps a mix of both.

Like it or not, Hidan and Shikamaru are stuck with each other, and Shikamaru thinks that might not be so bad after all, so long as Harry is there to mediate.

"We need to find out what Jashin meant – that the demon Kyuubi is following Harry." Hidan says seemingly out of the blue.

"How do we do that?" Shikamaru looks down at Harry, still curled against them. There isn't any help or answer to be found there for once, and it's a disquieting possibility that one day that may be forever for him - them.

"You're a wizard, kid, _use your wand_." Hidan sighs, rolling his eyes to the darkening sky above.

"Right." Shikamaru keeps one arm still curled around Harry, and with the other he draws out the wand, using the tip to make a circle in the sand and not sure what else to do – he thinks of a fire, like the one he'd seen Harry make that first night together.

Surprisingly, or not so much – one appears in the circle.

Shikamaru wants to ask ' _Now what_?' but there is no one to answer, and maybe Harry wouldn't even if he could, wanting to see what Shikamaru could do on his own – and he doesn't want to feel like a idiot if Hidan can answer him.

Shikamaru thinks of home, and in the flames the Hokage office of Konohagakure appears.

Naruto stands front and center of Tsunade, who paces the floor.

"You're sure of what you saw?" Shikamaru has never liked people who dismiss Naruto, not since personally meeting the messy haired blond with sky blue eyes and forming his own opinions on who he is and isn't.

"Yes, yes I'm sure." Naruto doesn't sound like himself, he sounds distracted and worried and somehow through the flames Shikamaru looks though those eyes and hears a voice that only Naruto has.

 ** _Well, brat, at least you've been honest with her, you're friend is most likely dead, if I'm any judge of the wizards actions_.** Burning red eyes see into the world through Naruto's blue ones.

"It's a wizard, isn't it?" Naruto speaks; his eyes show his feelings, blue and dark as the sea in a storm.

"Is that what Kyuubi says? In all the history of shinobi, there has only been one wizard, the Sage of the Six Paths that split the Ten-Tailed Beast. He called himself the wizard, the last one, told us all the lore about them that we know, so we'd know what to look for to find another one. There has never been another one. Not until we trained with him – Orochimaru." Jiraiya spat, again the demon spoke unheard.

 ** _Another one, hm? Interesting, very interesting, indeed._** Kyuubi purred, and Naruto remembered the wizard – _the wizard_ that was the Sage of the Six Paths – nodding in acknowledgement of what was within him.

 _How is it interesting_? Shikamaru was surprised when he heard Naruto speak back to the demon, and more surprised when the demon chose to answer ungrudgingly.

 ** _Where there are two wizards, brat, they'll breed more – the ancient blood will sing_**. Kyuubi sounded very pleased indeed.

"Isn't he supposed to be dead?" Naruto looks out the window at the sleeping city below. It does not seem strange to him that such ancient things sprung from the roots of this city. Naruto is living proof that there are things out there shiniobi do not understand – that they fear.

"Could be, it's been centuries, the lore says a lot of things Naruto, that the ancestors of the Senju and Uchiha clans were the sons of the Sage of Six Paths, that the Sage of Six Paths created the moon as a trap – some of it is just a old story, a myth of our ancestors making to glorify certain clans – yet somehow one man _did_ become the first jinchūriki, and _he did_ split the primordial Ten-Tailed Beast into the Nine we know, he may not have made and hung the moon, but he did something worth remembering – and there was someone very like a brother or son or shiniobi who fought the Sage of Six Paths after he became a jinchūriki. We may have gotten it wrong after all these years; it may not have been simply because of the envy at a elder brother being passed in succession to the younger, but a younger brother was attacked by the elder after the Ten-Tailed Beast was sealed. The tablet tries to tell that much." Jiraiya spoke and both Naruto and Tsunade listened, and Shikamaru watched them wide eyed as he thought of Harry, the Harry he knew – and Hidan who loved his brother. It seemed an impossible guess that Harry and Hidan could be so old, _centuries_.

Naruto stirs from the window, and when he turns to look to the Hokage and his mentor, his blue eyes are a ruin of bloody red.

" ** _Very good old man, you shinobi call the wizard the Sage of Six Paths, but we? We call him the Father of Demons, and he is the son of Death who teaches peace, and beside him walks his brother who is the only shiniobi in the entire world who can not die, who fought the Ten-Tailed Beast and won. If any can undo what this boy's father has done to me and his son, it is he. Pray, mortals that he will forgive you, for I will not_**." Fingers that end in claws grip the window sill and leave marks in the stone as Kyuubi flees.

Shikamaru takes a breath and jerks away from the flames, panting and his skin sweating from fear or the heat of the fire.

"What'd you see, kid?" Hidan asks, and Shikamaru sees him in a new light when he looks, but he still feels the same about him. Something in the way Hidan looks at him makes him think that he knows already, but he's asking to draw Shikamaru back to a reality he is familiar with.

"Hidan, how did you go back in time – to when Harry was?" Shikamaru asks, and his voice shakes. He'd learned the history of wizards and shinobi like everyone else, as if wizards had only died away as shiniobi had risen, and that had always felt like only a lifetime away. He'd never really thought about it beyond that, it was the past, after all.

Shikamaru realized he should have taken Naruto's outlook, but how could he so young with no demon within him?

"The same way you did, a wizard took me. I gave him my word, to kill a wizard for my brother, and broke my word when I found that the wizard and my brother were one and the same." Orochimaru is the wizard, the snake, the demon, that Hidan has been talking about all along, and Shikamaru have never listened close enough.

"Kyuubi is coming, he wants Harry to undo what the Fourth Hokage did to…to his son, Naruto." Shikamaru answers the question Hidan had asked him, he feels numb but aware of everything as Harry stirs in Hidan's arms.

Harry says nothing, and Shikamaru wonders how much he heard and saw and if it matters, for he only stares into the fire and waits.

Waits for the demon Harry created to come to him.

O.o.O.o.O.o.O


	4. -Blood-

Kyuubi moves with a silence Naruto never possessed, and there is an air of a _predator_ with a killer's instinct for the death blow that Shikamaru never wants to sense from Naruto, seeing his friend like this is _wrong_ , something inside of him wants to slink away into the dark, sickened by the shadows the fire's light revealed.

Cautiously, Kyuubi the demon in a human body comes forward, approaching but not daring to interrupt. It waits at the edges of the fireside light, until it is sure no one speaks. Only then does it dare.

" ** _Father_** …" Shikamaru has never heard a demon growl, and doesn't know if it's with respect or disgust Harry is being greeted with.

Naruto is a body that Kyuubi wares like a puppet, he's dirty and flicks of mud splatter in sun-shining gold hair, the whiskers on his cheeks look red and infected, and his eyes are bloody demon red. Red fire seems to burn his skin, and from his rear the shadow of nine tails flick.

Hidan says nothing, but watches, and waits.

Kyuubi nods in something like respect toward him, but his eyes, his focus, it's on Harry. Harry looks up from the fire, and he looks so tired and worn down, Shikamaru finally, honestly _believes_ Harry has lived all those years after all.

"Kyuubi the Nine Tails, I named you." Harry says finally, seeming to recognize Kyuubi only now.

Skittishly, those fiery red eyes flick away as if Kyuubi is touched to be named and remembered by Harry.

" ** _Yes_**." Kyuubi says softly, his words rumbling out of a human throat, behind fanged teeth.

"I know what you seek." Harry says, absently, as if he's known all along – and maybe he has, maybe he didn't need Shikamaru to see into the flames and speak of what he'd seen.

Kyuubi rumbles in agreement, and it takes a long time for Shikamaru to realize it isn't a growl, but a rumbling purr, the hum of it fills the air. Kyuubi lies on his belly, his head lower then Harry's slumped form against Hidan, and when Harry looks back to the flames, Kyuubi creeps forward as if seeking warmth.

"If your jinchūriki were to die, you would be free." Shikamaru's feels his heart become cold and broken in his chest.

" ** _That is not your way, Father. I am as immortal as you, and the boy is of your ancient blood. We are as brothers. I would not see a babe, my prison though he is, slain_**." Kyuubi still fills the air with a rumbling purr, he crawls forward a little more, not quite daring to touch Harry – but Shikamaru can see the yearning in his red eyes.

"Kyuubi, why did you attack Konohagakure?" It's as if Harry's been building up to ask this, and Kyuubi shies away as if he fears being stuck. Harry offers his hand to the red eyed demon that wares with ease the body of one of Shikamaru's friends. Kyuubi leans his head into this hand, and perversely Shikamaru wonders what that gold and red streaked hair feels like against Harry's fingers.

" ** _Madara, Father, the answer is within him. He seeks to become the jinchūriki of the Ten Tails."_** Kyuubi with Naruto's lips told Harry, and Harry didn't look surprised – didn't even flinch. Shikamaru frowned at the demon – because what it had said couldn't be true – didn't make sense. Nothing, in fact, had made sense since Harry – and irony of genius – wasn't that what Shikamaru had wanted all along?

For his life to be _more_ then a chain of concluding events: to hold in it mystery and mayhem in equal or opposing forces? Talk about getting what you wanted and finding it – lacking.

"I don't believe this." Shikamaru wasn't quite aware that he'd spoken it aloud until Harry met his eyes.

"See the truth for yourself, look into his mind." _His_ , Harry said, with a nod to Kyuubi, as if demons wearing the bodies of friends was something Shikamaru was just supposed to swallow with easy acceptance. Get _used to_ , even.

Naruto, who normally looked child-like in ignorance or innocence, but in a ninja's strength was so much more then met the eye, looked like something out of a nightmare. Where there was once ignorance is primitive knowing that stirs in those eyes like drops of blood falling into a still pool with no sure footing. In that innocence is a lack of something _human_ that makes Shikamaru's skin crawl.

Kyuubi sneers at him, smelling the reek of fear, the expression on his face tells Shikamaru clear enough what the demon thinks of him. Disgust on that face sends chills down his straightening spine.

Kyuubi offers a curled lip at the show of new strength, the feeling _pathetic_ and _little_ and _weak_ bleed off the demon in waves, daring Shikamaru to do it- to boldly put his too warm fingers against that soft cheek.

 ** _Tricked you_** , Kyuubi growls though his mind, satisfied and smug.

What he's done – _willingly_ , on a dare by a demon – near freezes Shikamaru.

He feels stupid and slow, but he dares to look around, to invade what isn't his to explore – this is a _mind_ , and it's more personal and private and intimate then Shikamaru had ever expected it to feel, but there isn't any sense of _right_ or _wrong_. It simply is. A mind, still growing – and Kyuubi on guard and protecting it (something Shikamaru hadn't really considered before), watching him with wary red eyes.

This, Shikamaru feels – is a test for both of them, somehow – and Harry's behind it, urging it on.

Naruto's mind isn't calm, isn't peaceful – it's a erupting volcano in a island forest, lava bleeds off into foaming sea, a endless expanse of stormy ocean as far as the eye can see.

The waves lap at his feet, almost eagerly. Shikamaru looks up and is aware of a blue moon and a great bloody sun sitting side by side in the sky. He watches them, and they wink out, then open – eyes, Shikamaru realizes, he's being watched by Naruto and Kyuubi side by side.

They wait for him to make the first move.

Shikamaru could explore this island, Naruto's mind – the thought doesn't have its own temptations. He wonders if he could get lost in that familiar looking forest, if the lava would burn him.

It isn't why he's here, though, so he thinks fondly _, another time_ and winks up at the blue moon of Naruto's eye.

He wades into the water, and it's wet and red.

Red like the eyes of Kyuubi.

Red like human blood.

It isn't a sea, and is – but not a sea of water, a sea of blood.

An ocean of blood, stretching out endlessly as far as his eyes can see.

Shikamaru chokes down his nausea, his stomach feelings like a rolling pit. He wades into blood, and wonders who's blood it is – and if it is his, will perhaps _become_ his, and he just doesn't know it yet.

Kyuubi laughs and the sound is the storm, the heaving of waves the roar of thunder and the flashes of lightning.

 ** _Sea, mortal, see? You shall see_**. **_Sink or swim_**. The demon promises him, his voice booming and vengeful.

Shikamaru flinches, wanting to turn away – to run.

A hand that is warm and alive touches him, Shikamaru jerks in that grip, unaware that before he'd been so cold. The hand is not escaped so easily, when he turns, he turns into memory.

He stands not on the uncertain sand of a sea of blood, but with a woman with red hair smiles at him. They stand in a sea of yellow grass.

Shikamaru catches his breath, _this is not the end – she is not Death_ , he realizes and can inhale around the thought, small comfort that it is.

"You do not belong here." She eyes him, and there is a mischief in her blue eyes that reminds Shikamaru of…of Naruto.

 _Oh, Naruto_. Shikamaru thinks his heart breaking.

"No," Shikamaru finds his voice to rasp, speaking is harder then he'd thought it would be, "I don't, I'm…I'm looking for something, someone." Shikamaru figures this woman is owed an explanation, if anyone.

"Whom, perhaps I knew him?" She suggests with a grin that he can't help but return.

"Madara." Shikamaru says without thinking it though, without really knowing why he does.

The name acts as a pebble thrown though glass. The red haired woman shatters and in her place stands a bent old woman with a noble face.

"Nara, you must be boy, to say such a name so fearlessly to my face in this place." It was whispered and Shikamaru stained to hear her words above a sound like thunder that came from the earth. He bends to touch the straining ground, but it was still.

"What, _who_ are you?" Shikamaru asked, looking up at her.

Her lips trembled in a smile, as she answers. She is amused by him, Shikamaru Nara realizes.

"I am Mito Uzumaki, wife of Hashirama Senju, your First Hokage." She turns and looks over her shoulder, the field of yellow stretches upward from there to a ridge. Rushing down from it are horses, the thunder of the earth is their hooves.

"You are more then that, what about the red head before?" Shikamaru shouts, to gain her attention – to hear him self speak over the sound like an oncoming storm.

"You know who she is, Kushina Uzumaki, the mother of your own Naruto, wife of the Fourth. She, like her son after her, and like I before, we were all jinchūriki of the Nine Tails." Shikamaru shakes his head, chilled by the burdens of the Uzumaki.

"Why?" He yells for her ears alone to hear. She does hear him – what keen unnatural hearing it must be too, as she pulls him up to her mouth with surprising strength, she speaks into his ear but the words are burned like a brand into his brain – a clue that can never be forgotten.

"It is the duty of the Uzumaki, tied as we are to the Senju clan: their ancestor and ours was a younger son of the Sage of Six Paths." He pulls back, away – and she lets him – and he notices that her eyes and attention are now all for the riders and steeds who will soon trample them.

"He comes." Mito whispers, closing her eyes as tears escape from them. There is awe in her voice and respect and so much depth of feeling that Shikamaru wants to ease it, share in it.

"Who?" Shikamaru must scream so his voice is raw.

Mito Uzumaki reaches upward, as if to wave goodbye – but it is a gesture toward the lead rider who is the only one who carries the burden of a double rider, the man before rides a pale horse and hair is a fiery red – the boy behind, Shikamaru would know anywhere: with wild black hair that defies the wind to tame and glistening green eyes, he looks like he's about to weep.

The lead rider reaches for Mito Uzumaki's hand in turn; clasping it turns Mito into mist. Though it seems impossible, this man is the first jinchūriki of the Nine Tails: he pivots his horse to stand before Shikamaru, the other riders swing to circle around – surrounding him.

There are _nine_ of them: each of them is marked as jinchūriki, they ware their marks boldly, openly proud. The original jinchūriki, Shikamaru knows without asking.

"Madara seeks us." The nine riders say as one, and though Shikamaru knows what they were riding before looked and sounded like horses – they aren't _horses_ now, but Tailed Beast steeds.

"We are the chosen sons and daughters of the Sage of the Six Paths. I am Uchiha, the first brother – the eldest." A man with silky black hair and red eyes speaks, power and elegance burns within him. He looks to the red haired rider and Harry and his look smolders. Shikamaru is uncomfortably aware that the leer is full of lust.

"We are the first jinchūriki who joined with our bijū., offspring of the Father of Demons from the Ten-Tailed Beast. I am Senju the Heir." Possessively the wild red haired man curls his arm around Harry's waist, and sets his head on Harry's shoulder to nuzzle at his neck. There are whisker marks on his cheeks.

"Madara Uchiha has hunted down all but two of the jinchūriki and their bijū. He seeks to seal them together to become again the Ten-Tailed Beast. To undo what I did because I – a wizard – could not control them." Harry's tears trail from his eyes, but they are suddenly shinigami black, soulless and hopeless. Shikamaru jerks, but does not step away.

"How are you here, Harry?" Shikamaru asks, shakily. This is the mind of Naruto – his friend. And yet Harry stands here among nine demons in a field of golden grass.

"I was the first jinchūriki of the Ten-Tailed Beast. All jinchūriki are remembered by their bijū – in this case, the Nine Tailed Kyuubi remembers me – us - through the Ten-Tailed Beast." Harry's black eyes flick to the sky above.

Shikamaru catches his breath, curled in a fetal position with silver fur and scales are the glistening Ten-Tailed Beast: its single eyes closed. It rests all high in the blue sky above a field of golden grass within Naruto's mind. It has always been here, Shikamaru realizes with a dry swallow of bile.

Within all the jinchūriki, in the blood of the nine bijū is the heart of Jubi and Harry.

"Jubi." Harry greets it by name, crying still. Shikamaru has the awful thought that Harry weeps to see it asleep and unaware: even though Harry had become both Father of Demons and the Sage of the Six Paths by sealing its power into bijū and then jinchūriki. Harry's eyes close.

"If Madara seals together they will waken Jubi within me." Harry puts his hand to his face, forefinger barely brushing the tip of the lightning bolt scar that mars his forehead. The marking turns black and then red, the deep crimson red of spilling blood – and the marking spreads like a spider web across Harry's face. Harry's skin turns from deathly pale to black as skin, the jinchūriki's blood red markings on his face a vivid contrast.

Harry's closed eyes open and they are blood red, demon red. He smiles and his teeth are white. Shikamaru freezes, and Harry leans in close to whisper against his lips.

"I will be a god of death turned demon, and I will bring about war and ruin to _feast_ on mortal blood. There is then only one thing to do to stop me; do you want to know what it is Shikamaru Nara?" Harry asks, his words a promise sweet as can be, voice thick and low like shadows in the bedroom.

Shikamaru wants to run, to shake his head, to hold his hands over his ears and scream until it all goes away. He does none of that, he stands still and cold like stone, and listens and waits and watches.

Slowly, when Harry does nothing more then look at him, Shikamaru nods so as not to agitate Harry. He closes his eyes so not to see Harry, even though the image is carved and bleeding into his mind, his every thought and feeling tainted.

"Spill the blood of my blood." Lips are caressing with teasing tongue and teeth playing at his own lips, Shikamaru realizes how intimate and invading the touch against his lips feels. It's not a kiss.

Shikamaru jerks away, and brings his fingers to his lips.

There is blood on them, his blood – he looks up, his eyes full of who knows how much betrayal and accusation – but Harry and Jubi and the golden field with the jinchūriki riding bijū is gone.

Shikamaru opens his eyes to see the pale red imitation of Jubi's eyes staring at him from Kyuubi within Naruto.

Shikamaru meets Harry's eyes, and finds knowing there – Harry doesn't need Shikamaru to tell him what he saw, he knows it for himself.

"Kyuubi." Harry calls, and the Nine Tailed Fox looks to him with adoring demon red eyes.

"Would you have me for your jinchūriki?" Harry asks softly, his eyes meeting with Shikamaru's without once looking away.

" ** _I would be honored, Father of Demons_**." Kyuubi bows the head of his host, stretching to take off the bright orange shirt – the demon's seal marks are a searing red, wounds that look as if they are about to bleed.

Harry touches this mark, and closes eyes – the marks retract, creeping away under Harry's skin – when Harry opens his eyes, they are shinigami black. Harry brings his finger to his scar, and the silver scar brightens to red and bleeds.

When he takes his hand from his scar, something black grows to mars the skin of his arm. It's a black marking, and as Shikamaru stares at it, he sees the shape of the Nine Tailed Fox as if caught in ink.

It winks up at him, tails lashing as wildly as the waves of the blood red sea that surrounded the island of Naruto's mind.

"Well, what are you going to do next?" Hidan asks Harry, clapping his hands as if for an encore. Shikamaru thinks, _maybe_ , he has an ally in Hidan for Harry's health, even if they are not – will never be - friends.

"We will wait for the boy to wake up." Harry answers, soothing Naruto's golden hair – his head in Harry's lap.

"Sure, why not?" Hidan snarls, sarcastically.

Shikamaru is suddenly aware of how much time has passed, that it is night and the moon above is red.

He shivers, for it seems an ominous omen.


	5. Beasts

_\- Beasts-_

 

Naruto opens his eyes and knows they are his eyes alone.

They are blue of the sea and the sky under the summer sun. There is no hint of spilled blood in his gaze, the sign of taint by a Tailed demon. He, for the first time in his life, is free of it. There is an old sang, about the eyes being windows to the soul; and he hears not the faintest whisper or whimper from the other soul that he has grown up with inside him all his life. He doesn't, at first, remember why.

Naruto's attention fixes upon Harry – he is the first to notice that around Harry's green eyes is now a ring of red. It is something that could be missed, but not when Naruto lays his head in Harry's lap.

"Why?" Naruto asks in a frog-like croak, and Shikamaru hears it, the relief, and the accusation. Naruto does not know if he regrets his loss, or if he should rejoice. It was not his choice, to become jinchūriki – and not his choice to be rid of Kyuubi, his bijū. It was Kyuubi's and Harry.

"You are of my blood, and Kyuubi too, is not a parent supposed to protect their child?" From what and who Harry does not say, from that parent's other children, from the parent itself, from all and everything? The answer is supposed to be something between the three. Yet it is a strange and foreign something to Naruto, who has never had a parent, who grew up an orphan and alone and unwanted.

"You're…you're not my parent." Harry smiles sadly, almost in a whimsical way.

"No, I am not your father Minato Namikaze who was the Fourth Hokage, neither am I Kushina Uzumaki. Yet there is the blood of kin between us Naruto Uzumaki, between us and Kyuubi or I could not take your bijū and the blood that marks you." It is then that Naruto sees the black Kyuubi mark upon Harry's arm. It's like an inked tattoo but it is more like dried blood.

"He's going to come after you now." Naruto had gathered that they were a target to a Madara Uchiha, that much knowledge he had gleaned from the mind of Kyuubi.

"That's sort of the point, kid." For the first time Naruto notices he's not alone with Harry, he looks around and seeks Shikamaru with an old length of stick in his hand, he holds it as if it's poison and precious. Shikamaru looks glad to see him, but he's not the one that spoke. It was Hidan, who Shikamaru had told them was blown up and buried.

"My little brother likes playing the hero, the damned fool." It's chiding but fond, and Naruto feels a sick jolt, because if he's related to Harry, a name gotten from Kyuubi's earliest memories – called the Father of Demons among bijū, and the Sage of Six Paths among ninja – than he's also related to Hidan. He first wonders what other kinds of monsters are on his family tree. At second thought, he would rather never know.

Harry's lips twitch as if he might smile, so he might know all the thoughts that pass through his mind, or Naruto's face is simply as easy as that for him to read. It might be either; it might be both, because getting Harry to tell him outright might not be as simple as asking. Or perhaps it is.

"Why would you do this, Kyuubi wanted to protect you!" Naruto hadn't really understood that loyalty… that love his demon had felt – still feels he doesn't doubt – so deep and fierce, but it had bled between their souls and mingled so strongly that Naruto felt it now still. He thinks he will always feel it. Just like he will always miss and dread Kyuubi.

"He is content, Naruto Uzumaki. He could not come into me unwillingly." Just for a moment it's as if Naruto sees those living green eyes ringed in red flicker black, like a blink of the abyss.

Naruto feels lost, and it is more than the loss of Kyuubi who has been his anchor all his life, but a loss of power and personality. He feels the loss of Kyuubi keenly; it is not a power he can ever get back. He is lost, out of his depth, made small and mortal. It's because there is dread in him from looking into the abyss of Harry's black eyes and knowing there is an end, and it cradles his life in its lap. It makes him shiver, and Naruto makes a point not to look into those eyes again.

"What can I do now?" Naruto whispers the fear that has sneaked into him, sunk into his blood and bones.

"You know where the Shukaku the One-Tail is. Take us to him." It's a thing to do, a direction, and Naruto nods his agreement. If this is the one thing he can to do help, he'll do it well. Harry glances at Shikamaru and Hidan, a look that Hidan is confused about for a moment – but it is all the moment that Harry needs to twist the ring with a cracked black stone and gold rough band, and go where Naruto's agreement takes them. It is one twist, and a journey that Naruto has never known the likes of.

Where they find themselves is inside a sandstone structure that Naruto has only seen once, it is the Fifth Kazekage home, his personal rooms.

 _Oh shit_. Naruto has but a moment to think, and then there is sand swirling about them and they can not move for all that the sand moves freely and all too easily. The sand hisses and lashes the air, it forms snakes and it's like sitting in a nest of them.

"Gaara." Naruto hisses, looking around for the Fifth Kazekage who he calls his friend. He's sleeping, not three feet from them.

" _Gaara_!" Naruto yells, a snake rears made of sand, and strikes at Naruto – but Harry, quicker - puts his hand between its teeth and Naruto's skin. He grunts as the sand sinks into him, and the sand tastes his blood – and only than does it all gets dangerously still.

Gaara, blurry green eyed and messy red hair sits up abruptly, as quick as the sand snake had been. He looks at Naruto and Harry upon his floor, and at Harry with a snake of sand biting into him. At his glance, the snake of sand becomes but sand and it falls away from him, almost sheepish.

Temari and Kankuro come though the only door, weapons at ready, what they see give them a moment of pause. That's all the moment that Gaara needs to raise his hand and keep them from rushing into a fight. Between Sunagakure and Konohagakure has been a lasting peace since Gaara became the Fifth. It isn't that that saves them, nor wholly that Gaara calls Naruto friend, it's that Shukaku whispers that the blood is familiar, of family and the Father of Demons.

Shukaku is both whimpering and giddy at the very taste of it.

"Naruto, what are you doing here?" Gaara manages to wrap his tongue around the words, not greeting, not yet, but not an accusation yet either.

"He brought us. It was weird. I…don't know how." Naruto, as he's the one that was asked, speaks up with all he knows as an offering. Its better that Gaara think him ignorant than so confident as to enter here without as much as a warning – or a greeting; there are limits and lines between their friendship that Naruto doesn't dare bend or break. This is sort of a big one.

"The ring is called Resurrection, its oldest calling is memory, and it can take and give. I took the memory, and it took us here." Naruto stands, and if he's a bit unsteady about it he can't be blamed for it. That trip feels as if it twisted him inside out and spat him out by his navel first. Harry stays on the bare floor, it's not as if he's tired, but perhaps he is.

"Who are you?" Kankuro demands of him.

Harry smiles at Gaara, knowingly

"An introduction should be made by an intermediate who knows both of us, if I recall old manners well enough to say. So listen to your bijū, Gaara." Naruto looks between the two, and maybe it's that their green eyes are alike, but Naruto thinks that if he's related to Harry – he isn't the only one.

"Harry Potter, Father of Demons, Sage of Six Paths, wizard." Gaara recites, as if it's a lyric of a song.

"So I am." Harry agrees, with a nod of his head. Temari hisses.

"Impressive title, but that would make you centuries old – you don't look it." Harry's smile is dry but he tilts his head in agreement.

"I stopped aging with my death, because death always takes something, doesn't it?" Harry muses upon it, and Naruto shivers as he remembers his black eyes. He thinks that if Harry died, it may have stopped his ageing, but it gave him something too – and it was decayed and inside him.

"Why come here?" Gaara asks softly, and maybe he feels threatened or frightened, or maybe he's thinking it's best to speak softly to a mad man, like a rabid dog. Harry might be mad, but he's probably the most powerful madman in the world. It's worth a few soothingly spoken words.

"Shukaku the One-Tail. I have need to be joined to him, one called Madara Uchiha among the Akatsuki he has gotten all the bijū but yours Gaara. He would seal them all within his skin and Jubi would wake and destroy first the moon and then all the world. There is no controlling Jubi, no deterring him, no reasoning with him. I had tried, and failed – and although Madara Uchiha was of the first jinchūriki bloodline, his blood is not mine – and he would fail and fall so far there would be no saving him, or anyone." Harry says it calmly; as if it's an approaching storm he's not much worried over. Yet his eyes don't stray from Gaara's own.

"What do you want me to do?" Gaara asks, his gaze as serious as Harry's own.

"Let me carry Shukaku the One-Tail as I carry Kyuubi the Nine-Tail, and there will only be one place that Madara Uchiha will send Akatsuki – to me." Harry looks at his ring of black stone, and Naruto and Gaara glance between each other and wonder what Harry sees by the stone of Resurrection.

"If it is what Shukaku wishes." Gaara agrees, faintly, because he found Shukaku almost unbearable to live with most of his young life, until they came to a balance that suited them. It is that balance of power, give and take, which Gaara has become used to. A part of him wonders how good of a Fifth he will be without Shikaku.

" ** _To join with the Father of Demons? What demon would want otherwise_**?" Shukaku agrees, as if Gaara is to be dismissed with such ease, yet they are joined, and Gaara feels his demon's unease at Harry making such a tempting target. He senses too, that Shukaku would rather be joined with him and help him rather than be apart and within Gaara.

"It is what he wills." Gaara can't lie to those green eyes so like his own. It would be worse than lying to a child.

"So be it." Harry Potter agrees, and offers his hand – and Gaara takes it, from beneath his skin to Harry's Shukaku the One-Tail goes. The red ring about Harry's eye widens, swallowing the green by a hair. It is enough of a difference to strike Gaara as wrong and worrying.

Harry Potter winks, and with a twist of his ring, goes before anyone can say goodbye. Perhaps it's just as well no one says farewell, that implies a end –Gaara looks to Naruto, and his two older siblings – and he hopes that there is hope, that this isn't the end of Harry – or the world.

That somewhere in Harry is hope to live and win.


	6. Brains

_\- Brains-_

 

"That idiot!" Hidan yowls, like a cat that's gotten scalded by water.

"W-where did he go?" Shikamaru asks, wide eyed, he'd traveled with Harry on a trip very like that he just saw, but he'd never seen him come and go like that. It was quick; he hadn't even had the time to blink. Harry was just gone – and with him, Naruto.

"Where do you think?" Hidan asks, drier than any desert.

He's packing up the camp, with hasty jerking movements; Shikamaru can't do more than watch him. He feels that if he tried to help he'd only be hindering Hidan. Harry's older brother gets it done quickly though and even though Shikamaru watched him do it, it was neatly done, and everything they had is on Hidan's back – their bedding, cookery and silverware. Its things like those that Hidan and Shikamaru need to live, but Harry does not.

Shikamaru thinks of how strange it is, he knows it, but can't quite wrap his mind around what it means in the entirety. If anyone can understand it its Death's other son, Hidan. What _he_ knows though, Shikamaru knows better than to ask to have it shared, like some bit of chit-chat over tea and cookies.

What he's doing though, really, is avoiding thinking about where Hidan is walking off to. He spares no look over his shoulder for Shikamaru, only hollers like the ninja is some pet mutt his brother picked up and he doesn't care much for.

"Are you coming along or what?" It wasn't really a question that needed to be asked, Shikamaru follows Hidan as silent as any shadow.

"You know, things aren't always so crazy. This was actually supposed to be a safe and quite place in time."

Shikamaru might be silent, but Hidan apparently is anything but.

"It was for Harry's sake we came here, it's the time I was born in – isn't it funny, I was born in an earlier time but I'm the older? – ah, well, mother doesn't seem to care about small things like timing and birth." Hidan sounds as if he might be smiling, but Shikamaru doesn't catch up to walk at his side and see. He's more comfortable at Hidan's back – better than being before him, or beside him. Shikamaru hopes this way he'll have some warning if Hidan decides to get rid of him while Harry isn't looking.

"Me? The quite sort of drives me a little bit crazy, that's really the only reason I stuck around with Akatsuki after we, well, came here and now. It was in my memories, see? That little black stone of his it can find anything and anyone if there is a memory attached." He talks, either to Shikamaru – which at first it sounds like – or to thin air, or to himself. Shikamaru doesn't pause to ponder Hidan's sanity, or lack thereof, he knows better.

You can't live as long as Hidan evidently has without some issues.

"That's how Orochimaru came here if you ask me – but don't tell Harry, eh? I think Voldemort got a look at my memory back then, and that led to Orochimaru helping me get back then – confusing, yeah, but who really knows with a wizard's soul. I tell you, you can live with them, but you'll never understand them. And like hell am I going to live without my brother after all that I went through to get him." If there is one thing Shikamaru likes about Hidan, it might be his loyalty and love for Harry.

"Is Orochimaru like what _Jashin…Ginny, was?" Shikamaru thinks for a long while that Hidan won't answer, won't say anything else. He speeds up his pace and Shikamaru struggles to keep up._

"No, Jashin isn't much like Orochimaru when you come down to it. Ginny was married to Harry, it meant a bond by body, mind and soul, so that part of Ginny that became Jashin, it…it was more like Harry than it was like Ginny." Hidan glances back at Shikamaru, who wonders what that look is supposed to be. A measure of how Shikamaru now thinks?

He thinks he can keep his feeling from his face; he's been practicing most of his life how to keep genius hidden with sheer laziness. It explains though, why Hidan had acted as he had, pleading on his knees with Jashin. If there is anyone in the world that Hidan might willingly be subservient to, do anything for, it's Harry.

"Orochimaru, well, there's line in that prophecy that can explain what he is to Harry better than I can, really. It goes: _… and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not_ …" Shikamaru can't see how Orochimaru, whatever name he went by, as Voldemort, or Tom Marvolo Riddle is at all equal to Harry now. Orochimaru has done terrible and great things, but Shikamaru has seen Harry do things that he doesn't think that Orochimaru could ever rival.

"The power the 'Dark lord' knows not, is that the Hallows?" Shikamaru's fingers tighten around the Elder wand in his worry.

"No, I don't think so." Hidan pauses and Shikamaru sees his strained smile.

"Harry told me once a theory and it sounds like a good one; he says that the Headmaster of his school told him the power was our mother's love. He may be right. Mother is Death, and she died for Harry. I think, sometimes, that she loves him more." What Hidan feels about _that_ , he doesn't show.

He seems to pick a direction – though Shikamaru can't tell why – and goes, as if he's chasing something, or running away.

Shikamaru thinks, but knows better than to say, is that if their mother really loved Harry she wouldn't have died- and left him orphaned and abandoned without a family that cared about him, after all she was Death, and so couldn't she have chosen _not_ to die? Maybe it's more complicated than that, but Shikamaru doesn't think it should be.

Shikamaru knows what will happen if Madara Uchiha succeeds in the task he's set to use the Akatsuki for. All the bijū, the chakra of Jubi will be put within Jubi and when Jubi wakens from his slumber sealed within the moon, Madara will than try to make himself jinchūriki of Jubi – something that Harry did not succeed in doing.

Yet there is a missing piece, between how Madara _knows_ of Jubi in the first place and why Orochimaru was in Akatsuki at one point. Hidan is not the kind of person to outright tell him if asked, but Shikamaru thinks that if he asks little things he can piece together from those answers the whole how and why of it.

"Orochimaru isn't human, as you know - but a demon. That means his soul was born of a beast, the serpent Nagini. He's little else but that soul. It's not nearly enough to make him a wizard again in this life, but he was a worthy shinobi." Hidan's matter of fact tone takes it for granted that Shikamaru might agree.

"The biju are closer to what he was as a wizard than they are too human or demon." Hidan's words are so soft that Shikamaru has to strain to hear him speak.

It rings in Shikamaru's mind, what he's heard said about Voldemort and Orochimaru.

" _He split his soul into what we call Horcrux, and he has done this seven times since. This Hallow ring was once one, a diary he had growing up that I destroyed before I knew what it was, a Hufflepuff founders cup – a Slytherin's locket, a Ravenclaw's diadem, my own living body – and his own shredded soul within him– all these had a shard of his soul, all were destroyed._

 _There was the eighth Horcrux, and this he put into his familiar, a snake we called Nagini_."

Shikamaru stopped moving forward after Hidan so he could think. Orochimaru had been brought about from Nagini. To destroy meant to put an end by attack or damage, it did not mean a final death. Anything might end to begin; a fire might destroy a forest, but that did not mean that new life did not grow after.

It was a small but significant difference, subtle, when Harry's and Hidan's mother was death, the end and beginning.

It had been Harry who had destroyed the Horcruxes, the vessels of Tom Riddle's soul; he'd destroyed things, not the shredded soul itself. Things like that that had been split wanted to be whole.

Shikamaru was sure in that moment that as Harry had been destroying the vessels of Voldemort's soul those souls had not been ended, but gathered within Harry, one by one.

Harry had died first, and Voldemort's body had been destroyed by Death. But what became of his soul –save for that soul within Nagini that would become Orochimaru – wasn't spoken of between the brothers.

At least not in Shikamaru's presence, and Shikamaru _knew_ that Harry was the Sage of Six Paths and the only one that … the _biju_ called Father. Shikamaru's swallowed, mouth dry, Hidan had looked back and paused in his step, staring at him with a frown, as if waiting for Shikamaru to either follow or explain himself.

"Jubi, the biju – what are they?" Now a days if the Sage of Six Paths was likened to a god, the Jubi had been likened to a primordial entity, but centuries ago, who was to say?

They could have been much alike, only the biju could say with any certainty what the Sage had looked like – hadn't they seen Harry and known? But no one except Harry and Hidan could tell him what Jubi had looked like.

"I'm sure you know the stories." Hidan sneers, as if it's not worth repeating.

Shikamaru wonders how strange it must have been for him to have both been part of that legend everyone who used chakra learnt, and being raised hearing it.

"I've not heard you tell them." Shikamaru knows that means something, Kyuubi had been willing to share all he knew and could recall, but between Hidan and Harry – who had lived through it, and perhaps not long ago – there was a pressing silence.

Shikamaru Nara, who was most content on lazy days of doing nothing but what took his whim, had never wanted to break a silence that had built like a wall between him and what he wanted so badly before. It lingered between them unspoken, until he thought Hidan just might keep it that way and go on without a word.

"This is how Tom Riddle might rise, and Harry might die, you understand that? You understand that knowledge is power, that if I tell you and you mess this up the next person who dies after Harry is going to be you?" Hidan's eyes are half shut, as if he doesn't want Shikamaru to see what passes through them.

Shikamaru doesn't want to know Hidan's thoughts, not really, to when his words make him cold with dread.

He does however, understand what Hidan says what he does, and Shikamaru wants to know how all the pieces of this puzzle fit together.

"Jubi is a part of Tom Riddle, a body and chakra reborn – while what is Orochimaru is a demon, a soul that doesn't match the body it's meant to have. If Orochimaru becomes the jinchūriki of Jubi – he will be a Dark Lord indeed, Voldemort risen, Tom Riddle's soul returned to its ordered body and chakra. If you think there is a difference between Harry and Orochimaru, there it is – but between Tom and Harry?" Hidan doesn't answer the question he leaves hanging in the air between them and Shikamaru understands without him saying it outright. They are equal, there is no telling if Harry would kill Tom first or Tom kill Harry – or if Death could let Harry die.

Hidan shakes his head, shakes away his fears and looks to where the Akatsuki hide. He nods his head toward it, putting finger to lips and knowing it is near and all the more dangerous for them now.

Shikamaru Nara holds tightly to the Elder wand, hoping as he follows the elder of Death's sons that he can give it into Harry's hands soon. It is some kind of irony that Akatsuki are named for the dawn… yet it is sunset when Hidan and Shikamaru set sight on the hideout.

It is burning, and with a look between Hidan and Shikamaru they share the same unvoiced fear – that they are too late.


	7. Beauty

Time – time, Harry thinks is a funny thing, for it seemed to him that when he had been younger it had taken every second of every minute and every hour for a day to pass. He was not aged, but older all the same, one day bled into being a week, a month, a year and he barely noted its passing. Yet between one breath and the next something could happen which he would never really have noticed when he was young, yet changed everything; a word - and all the memories that went with it.

" ** _Father_**." Shikaku, crazed but not crazy, the first of the bijū born from Jubi. His words rumbled in all the empty places of Harry's mind, filling them up, Harry felt the warmth and affection Shikaku shared without hesitation.

He was content.

Harry might not have seen or felt Shikaku since he had let the world he'd created, the family he had made for himself of jinchūriki who called themselves his sons – his daughters, for the love of their bijū …they had all thought him dead – including the bijū. Yet Shikaku and Kurama the Nine Tailed Kyuubi did not resent him, did not hate him for his absence, his abandoning them.

It was a balance, for Harry hated himself at heart for having their love and loyalty and being so careless with it. Yet in the end, he had chosen Hidan rather than a life built upon what had felt like a graveyard of what was, and what wasn't.

Harry remembered, remembered what he had said, so long ago that only a bijū might now recall.

"I don't have long any more. Shukaku, Matatabi, Isobu, Son Gokū, Kokuō, Saiken, Chōmei, Gyūki, Kurama. Even though you have been separated, you shall always be together. Until eventually that time shall come when you will become one… You each carry a name… And with a different shape than you had up to now, you will be shown a righteous path, different from the time you spent inside of me. What is true power… …Until that time…" He found he could not finish his words, all the so called eloquence of being the Sage of Six Paths failed him, and instead he looked upon them as they looked upon him.

" ** _Father_**." Shikaku had questioned with only that same word, First Tailed and the first born of Jubi and Harry. Nine bijū, just as there had been nine Horcruxes of Tom Riddle's soul. Harry was not fool enough to think that he had gathered all of Tom's soul – but he had done his best, and searched in every way he knew how. If there was a piece yet to find, it was beyond Harry's ability to find.

For now… he had to have rest, but he would not have that kind of time, not in the here and now.

" ** _What would you have us do, Father?_** " Matatabi asked, hunched low to the ground, Two Tails lashing. If a butterfly could cause a hurricane by flying, those tails could do much more – much worse.

" ** _It is not obvious_**?" Son Gokū demanded of Matatabi, smiling and showing his fierce teeth. To smile for an ape was a gesture of nervousness, or to threaten, but Son Gokū was too prideful to ever admit such a feeling.

" ** _Of course it is_**!" Saiken retorted, even though it was clear the Six Tailed slug bijū did not, its eyes peering at Harry as if an answer would show upon his face if only looked for hard enough.

" ** _Is it?_** " Kurama asked of them mockingly, his Nine Tails waving through the air like waves upon a shore.

" ** _What you wish of us, we will do_**." Shikaku assured, quickly. That much all the bijū could agree upon.

"You have born into this world, and so you must find your place within it. It is not an easy task, I know. Yet I can not hold you within my body again, so you must learn to live as all others take to life. I have found other teachers for you." Harry didn't doubt that those teachers were worthy – Hidan and he had worked to hard to find the proper sort of people, who would suit one on one with a bijū.

" ** _We do not want other teachers_**." Kokuō spoke up, aware of the awkwardness of the body of a dolphin and horse combined had made the Five Tailed bijū quiet and watchful. Nearly …wary, in that Harry was most aware of the danger of.

"You don't get to be coddled like little bijū babies anymore, time to finally grow up and face the world without being leashed to my brother like beasts." Hidan spoke up, letting his voice be heard.

Isobu, who was nearest to Hidan, suffered to be patted on the shell, going still and silent with so much attention nearly upon him – though directed at Hidan were snarls and hisses and Chōmei's giggles. Harry half-blamed Hidan for how shy Isobu was – but Hidan had went on teasing that if the other bijū got upset with him he'd have Isobu for a shield. Isobu certainly wouldn't say anything if the Three Tailed bijū minded it.

" ** _You are so little and small and you call us babies?_** " Chōmei chittered with delighted mirth, as there was nothing that the rhinoceros beetle could not find funny.

" ** _Want to test that theory little man_**?" Gyūki rumbled as the Eight Tailed ox octopus slammed a fist into the ground, making Hidan lock his knees to keep upright – if not very steady. Hidan smiled, and it was more dangerously threatening than Son Gokū could have managed. Gyūki's skin was always a berserker red, and Hidan had engaged him in a fight more than once, teasing that all that red only made a better target to hit at.

" ** _Peace, Hachibi… let our Father finish speaking_** _."_ Matatabiinterrupted the threats before they could become more. Of all the bijū, Matatabi was the best mannered, and such a skill as that was a powerful weapon. It was easy for Matatabi to manipulate others, if the Two Tailed bijū so willed it.

"Thank you, Matatabi. I would like you to meet with these teachers now." Harry knew they had not expected him to tell them his plans – and act on them so soon. All the bijū were young and that meant they would react by a surprise either with eagerness or with upset. None of them would be happy about his leaving; he wasn't expecting them to be impatient to meet their…teachers, their jinchūriki _._

" ** _Must we_**?" Kurama asked, red eyes meeting those of the other bijū one by one and finding in them all the same reluctance.

"I can not force any one of you, I only urge you to see the wisdom in this and trust that I have the best for you in mind." Harry had never lied to any of the bijū, and Hidan might tease them by calling them babies – but Hidan had a way of saying the truth about something in a mocking way, the way it could hurt the most – even if he didn't mean it to sting. Harry had created the nine of them, and raised them, and now…now he had to let them go, let them grow – and hope he'd done the best for them.

" ** _Father…let us meet these…teachers_**." Shikaku, eldest – but not the most powerful, and that lack had twisted something in him. Harry only hoped that binding the bijū to their jinchūriki would ease the tanuki's mind.

"Finally, let's get this mess over with." Hidan mouthed so that only Harry could see the unspoken words, as if a prayer he dared not speak least it turns into a curse. Harry nodded, and clapped his hands, from his house they came – nine of them, three women and five men he had hand chosen for this task.

Not even Isobu could hide his curiosity, peering down at each, and Harry had to wonder what he saw – if he saw these soon to be jinchūriki as Harry and Hidan did.

"This is Daikoku Mahakala, he will wield Benihisago, the gourd, and partner to you Shikaku." The tanuki bijū eyed Daikoku, and looked to Harry, and nodded once in acceptance. It was Harry's hope that Daikoku who was crazed in his own ways would teach Shikaku to take care with whatever wildness he took to.

Daikoku grinned, seeing the challenge in Shikaku, and a worthy companion. He winked at Benten Biwa at his side who smiled, pleased at her friend's pleasure. The necklace about her throat was of a white serpent. It did not move, so must be made of something, but she had not told the Sage of Six Paths if it was ivory or silver or something stranger – and Harry had not asked.

"Matatabi, you must forgive my eagerness to greet you. I am Benten and I will wield the sword Shichiseiken." Benten bowed but once, earnestly and with a flourish, and Matatabi bowed back so that they met eyes as equals.

Isobu looked over those who remained and seemed to despair. That was when Fukurokuju Hokkyokusei, an old man, steps up to him and speaks softly, but sure.

"We will be great friends you and I, and will talk about all the things there are to see." Isobu went very still at being so directly addressed by a stranger, head tilted as if unsure if to nod in agreement, or shake it in disinclination.

Fukurokuju patted his side and sat down beside him, content to get to know Isobu slowly – he untied from his staff a book and began to read from it – but it was Kōkinjō, the golden rope. Isobu eyed it warily, but when Fukurokuju let Isobu see the pages of his book, it did not take long until the Three Tailed turtle was engaged as well.

It was Fukurokuju's way to put others at ease, to treat others as old friends and have them be so in truth before the end of the day.

Benzaiten Veena eyed Son Gokū, and he was engaged by her steady stare – it became a matter of pride for the Four Tailed ape, not to look away first in this staring contest. Benzaiten smiled first, and that made Son Gokū blink.

"Heed me Son Gokū, for the Yata no Kagami is mine, and while pride may fall – a mirror will not lie." Son Gokū scratched his ears thoughtfully, and nodded, willing to learn to like the strange woman who was both wise and so forward.

"A good day to you Kokuō, and I think between you and me there are many more to come." Ebisu Hiruko looked over the sea of golden grass to the sea that the sun would set upon, toward the sea he looked with longing. He leaned against his fishing poll which was as strong as any staff, tied to his back was the Kohaku no Jōhei – and Kokuō worried at what was in it – and… _asked_.

" ** _What would you catch in that_**?" Curiosity could after all often overcome a reserved nature. Ebisu was not offended, but laughed outright in something like delight.

"Nothing that didn't deserve to be sealed away from the world – I think you would agree if you knew." Ebisu was not at all unsure of it, and Harry knew that confidence to not be without worthy ethics and morals.

" ** _Tell me more_**." Kokuō demanded with a lash of Five Tails.

That was just what Ebisu Hiruko did in so soft tones that no one but Kokuō could hear.

Hotei Budai chuckled, he was most unlike the others, for he was short and round, and hooked into his ear was the Yasakani no Magatama. The jewel caught the light of the sun and caught too the attention of Saiken.

" ** _How lovely, I think it would make a splendid necklace for me_**." Saiken tells Hotei, who pauses to look upon the Six Tailed slug, looking upon it thoughtfully. Saiken who has never hesitated to say something finds it uncomfortable to be so eyed.

"I think you are right, but it is earned – not given." Hotei's tones are not meant to subdue, but to encourage – and challenge.

Saiken pauses for a breath – and it is enough.

" ** _I will, you'll see_**!" Hotei lets Harry see him wink.

Kichijōten Lakshmi does not see Hotei's wink, but she laughs loud enough that Chōmei can not help but be charmed by its happiness. Chōmei looks and sees a fan of red and white beforeKichijōten's lips.

" ** _How lovely, what is that_**?" Kichijōten lets it whirl in her hand by its handle; a small breeze lifts Chōmei upward playfully.

"Bashōsen, isn't it Sage?" Harry's lips quirk upward for he knows that Kichijōten is teasing.

"It is." Harry nods, as if Kichijōten doesn't know that very fact – and every use of Bashōsen besides.

" ** _I would not mind learning more with you_**." Chōmei admits, cheerful and a bit shy, as if not sure of how welcome that suggestion is.

"Likewise, my dear Chōmei." Seven Tails wiggle with quiet delight at this unlooked for luck.

BishamonTamonten rolls his eyes at their easy familiarity, but he eyes Gyūki with something like approval. His hair his black but his eyes are as red as the skin of the Eight Tailed ox octopus bijū before him. Gyūki has never wanted the approval of anyone, never needed it – even if Harry had given it to him freely …perhaps too freely. Bishamon was made of sterner stuff.

"This is Kusanagi no Tsurug, and it will slay what needs to be killed, with you or without you beside me. What will it be,Gyūki?" Bishamon asks, and perhaps it is a little luck that has kept him from hurt – but Harry thinks there is more skill to it than Bishamon lets on.

" ** _If it must be, it must be. I will stand at your side, not behind, not before_**." Bishamon grins and there is some bloodlust in it.

"I would have it no other way." Bishamon's children by Kichijōten Lakshmi will be called Uchiha for her fan, but having his eyes.

At his words Jurōjin Gama, younger than he, but with whiskered cheeks and red hair, he openly rolls his eyes. He is a match for Harry in any and every skill, and his children will be called Senju for inheriting that gift.

It is not without a certain sense of kindred understanding that Kurama looks at him – at his reaction, with approval.

" ** _What do you hold in your hand?_** " The Nine Tailed fox asks, grinning with sharp teeth. Harry does not know if it is a greeting or a threat. Jurōjin takes it to be both, but returns the expression like for like.

"Shakujo." The staff with its twelve monk rings needs no telling of how skilled Jurōjin must be with it. It is the first of its kind, a weapon which Jurōjin will only wield for peaceful purpose, to protect or defend.

" ** _I like the look of it_**." Kurama declares, and Jurōjin offers a rare smile, glancing to Harry to note his reaction – it is a look that his elder brother Bishamon catches too. Kyuubi notices that too. He inhales and smells something he thinks to ask his Father of later.

There is not to be a later.

"Do you think you two will make a good match, Kurama?" The Sage of Six Paths asks, and Kurama can not say no, and only nods in approval.

Harry Potter sets the seal to bind each bijū to their jinchūriki.

It is the best thing he thinks he's done with his life.

Until now….

Harry Potter - Sage of the Six Paths the Savior of this World and Father of Demons – is going to get his children.

Just that easily, between the twist of his ring and a breath, he is within the heart of Akatsuki.

As if in greeting Madara Uchiha claps.


	8. Bones

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If the names of the original jinchūriki of the bijū are familiar they are meant to be. They are the same as the Seven Lucky Gods:
> 
> Hotei, the fat and happy god of abundance and good health
> 
> Jurōjin, god of long life
> 
> Fukurokuju, god of happiness, wealth and longevity
> 
> Bishamonten, god of warriors, and the north
> 
> Benzaiten (Benten-sama), goddess of knowledge, art and beauty, especially music
> 
> Daikokuten (Daikoku), god of wealth, commerce and trade. Ebisu and Daikoku are often paired and represented as carvings or masks on the walls of small retail shops
> 
> Ebisu, god of fishers or merchants, often depicted carrying a sea bream (fish)
> 
> Kichijōten, goddess of happiness (who if present replaces Jurōjin)
> 
> I've always thought of Benzaiten being a different goddess from Benten; their weapons are the Treasured Tools of the Sage of Six Paths and the Imperial Regalia of Japan (sword, jewel, mirror). As well as a "simple" shakujo staff.

_As if in greeting Madara Uchiha claps._

Kurama's growl echoes in Harry's ear, and he realizes it's his own lips making it. The growl is warning and threat all rolled into one, and when Harry fixes to close his mouth, the Nine Tailed fox is not sorry at all, but goes silent and watchful within him. It is better than Shikaku's giggles.

Harry Potter tilts his head, studying what is before him with narrowed eyes. All appearances aside, he is the Master of Death – all dead obey him, and Harry knows all the dead. Madara Uchiha is dead. He, however, left enough of himself behind to be remembered and mimicked.

"Take off that mask." Harry's words quiet the Uchiha's clapping.

"You know I won't." The black stone upon a ring of gold flashes, catching light – with that glint, that small wordless summoning, from the shadows steps the spirit of Madara Uchiha as if alive and in his prime.

"Who is he?" Harry looks to the spirit as he speaks, and Madara laughs softly to himself.

"Why, Master – it is an Uchiha. Obito the boy was - I think he goes by the name Tobi now..." The masked Tobi goes still, for is nothing the dead not know. Harry nods his head in something like acceptance or thanks.

"Why do you call _him_ your Master?" Tobi demands, looking again at Harry as if he can find what makes him so important. Tobi can sense that this is Madara, if not in flesh than in spirit – for it feels too much like him to be a lie.

"It's what he is, Tobi-boy, the Master of Death, the Father of Demons, the Savior of this World." Madara Uchiha bows to Harry after calling him such, and there is very little mocking in it.

Tobi looks between the two, he had thought when Madara had told him of the Sage of the Six Paths that it had been a bit of history so that he would see Madara's dream and take it up. Obito had, with all his heart, dedicating his life to seeing it accomplished.

"You…warned me of him?" Obito guessed, frowning, for Madara had called the Sage of the Six Paths by the same titles he gave to this man who had appeared in the heart of the Akatsuki hideout. He had thought that perhaps this was another man who meant to join him, join the dream of Madara. Yet, clearly it wasn't so.

"Indeed I did." Madara Uchiha in the spirit, admitted, looking about himself with a small sneer of distaste – Obito knew these chambers would not be to the other's liking, but certain scarifies had had to be made to being his goals to fruit.

"Was this within your plan, Madara Uchiha?" Harry asks of him, and knows he must be answered.

"In part, Obito was meant to bring about the wakening of Jubi – and I know enough of the stories told by my ancestors to know you, Master, would come to put a stop to it… that you might summon my spirit to fully account for my deeds – great and small. In truth, meeting you was the point of it…at first." Madara Uchiha smiles and it is not something secret but something that shares knowledge.

"It isn't now?" Harry tilts his head, suspicious.

"No, it isn't." Obito answers, while Madara Uchiha smiles. The masked man rolls up his sleeves and Harry sees the Kōkinjō, golden and shining upon his arm – he reaches out and it wraps about Madara Uchiha, who is soul, is spirit, and the only thing that holds him to this world is the Kōkinjō rope – for Harry's tie to him is lost.

"Stop this – you don't know what your doing!" It is all that Harry has time to say; regretfully Kurama nudges comfortingly within him, stilling his panic - sharing it.

" ** _He does_**." Harry knows then that Kurama had had Madara Uchiha for his jinchūriki once. Yet that once had been more than enough to learn all that the Nine Tailed fox knew, Harry hissed at what he now knew Madara had done to Kurama – what had not been shared by the bijū until now, in this moment.

His child had been tortured – there was no other word for what Madara Uchiha had done in hosting Kurama. It had been no kind of jinchūriki bond.

" ** _What is done, is done, Father_**." Shukaku whispered, and it was no comfort to see by his children's eyes what Madara Uchiha had done, he had been the source of sudden panic against the bijū. When Kurama had been let loose upon Konohagakure he had turned not just the Hidden Villages but all people against the bijū – and how the Tailed Beasts had suffered for it.

Death had not been good enough for Madara Uchiha.

It _should_ be impossible, to take from the Master of Death a spirit of the dead – but these are the Treasured Tools that Harry gave – and made. Perhaps if Harry had paused in his fury, he would not have chosen to let Madara Uchiha slip from him – half guessing what Madara and Obito would do next - he watched and let the golden Kōkinjō take what was his.

Madara Uchiha is still smiling when Obito speaks a thing which should be imposable to know, the kotodama – the word soul of the spirit he's taken. Madara Uchiha opens his mouth, and says Obito's own kotodama – and Harry smiles back at Madara Uchiha, and it is dreadful to see.

Madara's eyes widen in unease, for both Obito and Madara had let their own soul's names be known to each other – and to Harry. There is no protection for them when Harry Potter keeps those two kotodama in mind and speaks words that are more than spell – they will become Madara's and Obito's reality.

"Let kin blood bind kin spirit." It is a spell, and a command – and at it Madara and Obito scream together, suffer together, one knowing what death is –it's empty nothingness – and one remembering what life is like, it's pain – when a spirit knows no suffering. Harry watches, not nearly satisfied, as Madara is bound within the body of Obito – one does not possess the other, the binding is like what a bijū and a jinchūriki share.

As close of a bond as Harry can manage it - he wants them to _suffer_.

"How does it _feel_ , Uchiha?" Harry asks softly as a hiss watching the body of Obito fall and writhe upon a dirty stone floor as Madara recalls what pain is, what life is – and Obito magnifies it.

" ** _Father…you did not have to do this_**." Kurama knows this was done for him, for all of them. In him is no regret, neither is there any in Shukaku – only protective worry.

"What father would not protect his children and punish those who harm them?" Harry asks of no one, stepping over Obito who rolls upon the floor as if wrestling with Madara. His hand touches the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path, the body of Jubi. The bijū are sealed within it.

"Do you know what else I did, Master of Death?" It is the voice of Madara that speaks through Obito's lips. Harry tilts his head, looking upon the face of Jubi, its husk and its eyes blindfolded.

"The Tailed Beasts are your children – but Orochimaru is _mine_." There is a hiss, and Harry pivots to turn his back upon the so called Demonic Statue of the Outer Path, and turns to see Orochimaru before him.

"Hiruzen Sarutobi taught him, Master, did you know?" Madara is bitter about that, for Hiruzen Sarutobi had been raised to become Hokage, while Hashirama and Tobirama had not so much as asked Madara Uchiha what he had thought of such a choice.

"I had no part of Konohagakure's founding." That is a thing that Madara is obsessed with, the root of perfection in making and unmaking something. The thing he was most apart of. He loves it as much as he hates it – and those feelings, Kurama warns with silence, are linked to Harry.

"I know you were not there in body, after all I was there – but in spirit, how can you deny it? Are not the Senju and the Uchiha decedents of your sons?" Harry narrows his eyes upon Orochimaru, who is content to bid his time and hear what Harry answers to what Madara asks.

Inhuman laughter fills the dark and empty places of both the air they breathe and heart of Madara. It is laughter he recognizes, it is the laughter of the Nine Tailed fox he had once taken within him.

It blazes into existence to stand at Harry's side, giant and menacing like a shadow.

" ** _You are no son of the Father of Demons, mortal_**. **_None of your clan is – I denounce it, disown all but Uzumaki that were born of Senju. They alone can claim to be true sons and daughters of my first jinchūriki – Jurōjin_**." There is a flicker of fondness in Kurama's tones still, for that long ago day he found his first host, friend and teacher. That had been a man worthy to be called Harry's son through Kurama – but Madara? Never. Kurama would not have it, and would make sure Madara knew it.

"First _jinchūriki._..?" Madara looks to Harry, desperate for some sign of denial he never sees.

" ** _Yes, I kept that much from you didn't I, even as you stole from me what you willed…? Both your revered ancestors ….the so-called sons of the Sage of the Six Paths were blood brothers, but not sons born of the Father of Demons – they only came to be called sons of the Father of Demons for their hosting bijū within their bodies and holding that bond between bijū and jinchūriki as the sacred trust it is meant to be_**." Kurama's teeth flashed in a fox's grin – taunting and dangerous, but true.

"Tell me this isn't true, Sage of the Six Paths…" Madara Uchiha pleased like a broken man.

" ** _Why should he lie to you? It is true – and we know don't we Kurama? We were there, after all, we lived it_**." Shikaku stood now at Harry's other side, the two bijū shadowing him. Shikaku grinned down at Orochimaru, recognizing what was within him.

" ** _Father, there is a piece of me within him, shall I eat him and return it to its rightful place_**?" Orochimaru does not step back, not with the gazes of two bijū, or the words of one who means them– or with Harry's own green and red ringed eyes watching him carefully.

It does not mean that Orochimaru is afraid, he is more curious than afraid.

All his life he has sought immortality of one kind or another, and here is one who has it – one whose body is dead – but he does not _die_. It is curious, and fascinatingly terrible.

"Is it your resolve to be whole?" Harry asks of Orochimaru, as careful as he is curious.

"What would happen to me, the so called son of Madara Uchiha who loosened me from a snake's body - to them, the bijū – your so-called children, the shards of my – and their – soul?" Orochimaru looks upon his skin; it is living, as living as the body of Jubi is clearly decayed and dead. It is no more than a mummified husk – powerful, yes, but it would not survive a whole soul.

"What would become of us?" Orochimaru wonders again, looking at Harry, determined to have an answer. Harry too would have his answer.

" ** _Answer our Father_**." Kurama demands and Orochimaru's blue eyes flash.

"Is he _our Father_? Is he truly?" There is hope there, and hate, and Orochimaru does not know which is stronger.

"Did you give up upon me? I think you were broken by it, that you came to care about a man who had hunted you, marked you, killed so many – even your own parents….I have these memories, _do they_? Do your precious bijū?" Orochimaru glares upon them, the bijū who share his soul – but who are loyal and love Harry – while he…he does not know if he can accept anything from Harry and call it true and right.

"My children are the bijū born of Jubi and I. Jubi was not whole when born again into this world, it maddened him – he could not be healed - and this was my fault. I spent precious time while the world went mad and warred between the living and the dead – between demons and mortals, looking for what part of Jubi was lost. I knew it was near here – but beyond that, it was hidden from me – how was that done, Orochimaru?" Harry asks of the man who stands before him, slender and pale, with blue eyes so dark as to be black and black hair that is limp, as if defeated and beaten. Harry is not fooled.

"We share blood, for did not my servant take it?" Harry's eyes glint green circled by ruby as they widen in something like shock – the kind when someone does not believe they can be so suddenly hurt.

" _Mother_ …?" She stands between Harry with Kurama and Shikaku beside him and Orochimaru, the last piece of Voldemort's soul – and looks to the joining of Madara and Obito Uchiha with something akin to disapproval. She sighs, and the body of Obito goes limp and Harry watches his mother swallow their souls.

They will never return to this world.


	9. Balance

 

 _"_ Mother _…?" She stands between Harry with_ _Kurama and Shukaku beside him and Orochimaru, the last piece of Voldemort's soul – and looks to the joining of Madara and Obito Uchiha with something akin to disapproval. She sighs, and the body of Obito goes limp and Harry watches his mother swallow their souls._

_They will never return to this world._

Orochimaru shudders at the sight of it, stepping away from the woman Voldemort had once known as Lily Evans-Potter. What she has done - he fears. Orochimaru is a demon; it meant he had been a dead man's soul clinging to that of his familiar, the serpent Nigini. Such beings as he are unnatural, an imbalance, and he stands before Death the great balancer of life and death.

"Do you remember me, Tom _Marvolo_ Riddle?" And how could either Harry or he forget the first meeting with her? Her words are curiously inviting.

It flashes through Harry's mind, like the lightning scar Voldemort gave him.

_"Lily Evans, I killed you." Serpentine eyes don't flinch from the living green fire of death, he steps forward, wand raised as if to do it again._

_"Tom Marvolo Riddle, do you think it so easy to slay what I am? I am not merely an idea, and whimsy element of nature – I am inevitable, I am the end of the beginning and the beginning of the end; I am Death." She stands, elegant and graceful with every sinister movement; she steps forward, shielding her children from harm. "I am their mother, and I am not a mere mortal; you will learn well what that means this day. You have hurt my sons. I end you now." Her finger pointed at him in this declaring, and he burned to embers – the wind scattering his still burning ashes. Like fire, it spreads and catches, and wizards and witches scatter, screaming – attempting to flee her wrath. None succeed. She spares one glance behind her, and smiles softly to see her sons' safety, and still smiling she fades – as if she had never stood there at all._

Harry shuddered at it, as if the memory were a scar not quite – never quite all – healed.

"You killed me!" Orochimaru shivers, recalling that parting, for his soul had been aware of the great loss of a greater whole, sudden and emptying. All he had had to cling to was Nagini and she had clung just as tightly to him as she hid as the world around her ended as she knew it and another began to beat and scream its way into changing creation.

Death's green eyes were both pitying and gentle upon him.

"Did I? I am not the end all you think I am - I thought you whole in soul and sought to heal you, to make and unmake. It was a mistake and the whole of your race paid for it." Harry wants to deny her claim, but he hasn't the words for it. It made twisting sense, bitter and biting.

Now that Harry knew _this_ , what was he to do with it? Harry couldn't kill his own blood, his mother's son - even if that blood had been stolen. Harry did not doubt that Orochimaru could be ended, a severed bit of soul burned away into nothingness – like an amputated limb - but what of the bijū?

They would never be whole; they would forever be severed into nine personalities, nine identities. It was wrong. A limb severed from the body could still be felt, as confused nerves and a conflicted consciousness made the body – the awareness all the bijū had, that they should be whole – a phantom pain that would be unending.

Harry rejected outright doing something that would hurt the bijū – who rightly or wrongly – he had created. They were the only children he would have, if in spirit, not of body. Orochimaru had been lost and orphaned his whole life, with memories of another time and another way – and no one to turn to except Madara.

Madara who had somehow parted Voldemort's soul from Nigini…Harry looked upon the body of Orochimaru and wondered at it, if this was a Reanimation Jutsu. Whose body had been used? If Madara had done it, all that he would have needed to do once he had found Nigini and the soul of Voldemort was kill her – and it would send the soul on it's way – only to be Summoned back by Madara Uchiha.

Harry knew why his mother had done as she had – and a part of him approved of it. There would be no return for either Uchiha once swallowed up by Death.

"A mistake…? All of this…a mistake?" Orochimaru's words are soft and lost. It was his whole life and existence she had caused by her mistake. That is what it meant to have great power, not a reasonability, but a undeniable knowledge of what suffering doing anything could cause – but Harry's mother could not help but use her power.

People, both good and bad people, they died and were meant to die – everyday, and others were meant to be born. To stop would be not a mistake, but unthinkable. Like the moon and sun taken away. All the sky anyone would know would be the stars shining in the dark – and people needed both day and night, needed the moon as much as the sun.

"What –or who are you to _me_? _My_ mother? My _grandmother_ …? Lily Evans who I _murdered_ – or who _killed_ _me_?" Orochimaru asks of her, of Harry, of either of the bijū that might, or might not, answer. He yells and spits the words out as if they hurt.

Lily's red blazing hair is as wild and willful as if tossed by the wind, what it touches, it burns. The very stones and earth is afire, hot and molten. Yet it does not burn Harry or Orochimaru. Harry thinks he knows what she is doing; that his mother is proving a point – she can no more hurt herself than she can now hurt them.

The ring of red within Harry's eyes flickers as he watches the flames. If he sees something in the fire, he never says what he saw. It chimes through his ears, Orochimaru's claim upon him by Voldemort's deeds and the blood they now share.

_"We share blood, for did not my servant take it?"_

It can not be as simple as _that_ , so simple and devastating that Harry could join Shukaku in his nervous giggles and never cease.

"All of these, and much more besides - am I to you." Harry's mother tells to Orochimaru, as undeniable as the fire that roars around them. It should consume and burn their bodies, but it does not. The unspoken message is clear – their mother could no more harm them than she can harm herself.

Death reaches out a hand for Orochimaru to take, and offers her other to Harry, it is their choice now – to take it, or not to. Neither knows what will happen if they do – or don't – no one but the woman who would have them join hands by her own.

"I can not unmake a mistake, I can not recreate what I have destroyed…but I can make you whole, my son." Death smiled the same smile she had given Harry when she had thought him freed of a soul not his own, of an enemy he had loathed and learned to love as kin.

"Do it." Orochimaru speaks, as if it's a dare he takes her hand into his.

Harry pauses to look to Kurama, who nods uneasily – confident enough to believe that Harry will do what is right for them. Or to get them out of danger if this is wrong and Harry tries it.

" ** _Let us try_**." Shukaku urges, grinning but shaken.

Harry touches the husk of Jubi's body, with his hand that is marked by the Nine Tailed fox and One Tailed tanuki. Reaching out with Kurama and Shukaku he touches all the Tailed Beasts, joining them within him.

It is then that he takes his mother's hand.

Harry had had to use the Creation of All Things to part Jubi into the nine bijū. Madara Uchiha had used a Reanimation Jutsu to Summon a soul he had killed, and put into a body before the soul and could forget being Tom _Marvolo_ Riddle.

What Death did was like and unlike either – she breathed, and Harry noticed that he had never seen her do so – why would she need to? She wasn't alive, or dead, she was death – and more – the ending and the beginning of a force of nature, personified.

In did she breathe - a single gulp of air that shook Harry as he felt the loss of the Tailed Beasts and Orochimaru in that single inhalation; he would had protested it, cried out at the unfairness …if his mother had not reassuringly tightened her grip about his hand.

The body that had been Orochimaru became ashes in the fire.

Harry shut his mouth tightly, blinking away what tears wanted to form from his loss. A loss he felt as deeply as any bone and blood within his body. Fire, he knew, was a force of both purification and of destruction. It had been the first tool of mankind, used to warm them – and later, make weapons and what was most often overlooked – it allowed the cooking of food and so made possible feasts and gatherings that built the foundation of civilization.

Death gasped, breath going out – and out, shakily as the death rattle, the telling breath of the soon to die; the first cry of the newborn was like such a exhale.

About her other empty hand a shadow formed, and at first it was like a mirage, something only seen distant and hazy, but became solid the longer Harry looked – became as real as anything in this world.

She kisses his cheek, in greeting, in the welcome of family welcoming family, and goes – fading from sight as if she had never stood there.

Tom _Marvolo_ Riddle stood there, born again, the third time - with a soul made whole and anew. Harry could only hope that the old sang rang true – that the third time was the charm, that this time Tom would have a happy life. He was as tall as Harry, with blue eyes and hair as black as the night sky without stars.

Death had been his end, and his mother, his maker.

"Welcome, brother." Harry greeted, knowing the truth of it by his soul. It was true, that old warning of "you are what you eat", both in body – and soul. Voldemort had taken his blood, a sip of his spirit – what made him Harry - and it could not be undone.

Tom _Marvolo_ Riddle was his brother by that blood, by the blessing of his mother.

Tom offers him a shaky and uncertain smile – and that is when the crash of a wooden door hits the floor as it is beaten down in hasty panic. Tom looks to it, wide eyed – and Harry stares with a raised brow.

Hidan with Shikamaru burst through the door, looking ready for war. Harry smiles and knows only Tom can see it, as he stands nearest to him and his vision isn't clouded by smoke or flame.

"Harry - you in here?" Hidan hollers, looking about wildly, as if he fears what he will find.

"I am." Harry answers, taking Tom's hand as he walks without worry to the exit Hidan had made of an entrance. TomRiddle follows him, his hands clod and clammy with nervousness, but otherwise docile.

"Well, what are you doing? Let's go, fire might not burn you – and you might not need to breathe…but that doesn't mean this building can't come down around you and crush you flat." Hidan scolds him, as if Harry is a child that can't take care of himself. Harry might be more mature – but Hidan takes his responsibility toward Harry as the most serious thing in his life.

Hidan with Shikamaru set up a camp, just within sight of the burning hideout and resolves to find the other places Akatsuki hid and burn them out within the week.

"Who's this?" Hidan asks Harry nodding toward the teen that has latched upon his younger brother's hand, once they are safely outside and watching the hideout of Akatsuki burn.

Tom tilts his head at Hidan as if surprised that he is not recognized, he hasn't said a word yet – he doesn't know what to say. He's done so much he never wanted to – and if his soul had been whole, his mind would not have been so shattered by his splitting of his soul so many times…he doesn't think he would have done the things he had, had he been whole, as now.

Yet it's true, Tom doesn't look much like Orochimaru – and looks less like Voldemort at his end. He is whole and healthy; a flush comes to his fair skin.

Shikamaru frowns at Tom, curious – not wary or hateful.

"Tom _Marvolo_ Riddle, our mother's son. He's whole of soul and mind, not a jinchūriki of the bijū...simply, himself, normal" Harry answers as if it's as simple as that.

Hidan snorts, his hands tense and tight, but slowly he relaxes as he sees Tom doesn't react to the threat he'd made of himself. Harry might be too trusting of this new 'brother' for the sake of the bijū – but Hidan will watch and wait, just to see if all is as it seems.

"As normal as a wizard can get, maybe." Tom _Marvolo_ Riddle says, teasingly.

Shikamaru finds himself laughing, as he sits by the fireside of three brothers who must find a balance between the living, the living who do not die, and the living dead that does not die.

If anyone can find that balance, Shikamaru Nara knows, it's these three.

O.o.O.o.O.o.O

**_End_ **


End file.
